


Iron Man

by Starkk



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marv - Fandom, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-04
Updated: 2019-08-07
Packaged: 2019-10-04 01:58:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17295527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starkk/pseuds/Starkk
Summary: Lyra has been the prisoner of the Ten Rings alongside Yinsen for almost a year now, working on their weapons. Everything changes for her when an injured man shows up and she's the only one that can save his life.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! This is my first post here, I'm so excited!  
> This has been an idea that I've been playing with for a while in my mind and I wanted to share it with you all to see how it goes.  
> Please feel free to leave thoughts and comments!

Lyra opened her eyes to the sound of yelling. While this was not entirely surprising for her, it was something that she figured she should at least check out before deciding whether to ignore it or not. She slowly stretched the sleep out of her stiff muscles before dragging herself to her feet. Another day in hell. She squinted, trying to let her eyes adjust to the flickering light in the darkness. It occurred to her that her eyes should already be adjusted to this, since it hasn’t changed in almost a year. The fact that they were still hopeful for sunlight just depressed her more, since she had long given up. The yelling continued, and she looked over her shoulder to see Yinsen running down the hallway.

“We have a situation, follow me!” he yelled the moment he was sure that she would hear and then turned around and ran back down where he came from. Lyra heard the note of panic in his usually soft voice and that was the last motivator that she needed to shake off her haze. Yinsen wouldn’t panic unless something really bad was happening. Not sure if she needed to grab anything she looked around for a moment and then swore lightly and jogged over to the spot where he disappeared. It might be a trap, but what’s a trap to a mouse in a cage? The door to her room had been left open, which was odd, but she didn’t think about it as she passed through. She ran down the dimly lit hallway and when she didn’t see Yinsen she was beginning to wonder where he had gone. She spotted yet another open door to her left. She slowed to a stop outside of the door and the first thing that she registered was the smell of blood, hot and metallic against her nose. Inside was a stretcher, covered with a man who was covered in blood. Fighting back her sense of nausea, Lyra forced her feet to move her into the room.

“What is this? What happened?” She asked, arriving at his side and getting an eyeful of Yinsen already cutting into the man’s chest. She opted out to look at Yinsen, who had already put on his focused surgeon face and held out a small glass bottle, which she took automatically, still expecting answers. 

“Shrapnel bomb,” Yinsen said without looking up at her. He turned and placed something into the bottle that landed with a soft clink. She looked into it to see a blood covered scrap of metal.

Lyra ventured a look down to where Yinsen’s hand were working. The man’s chest was torn and bloody, there were more holes than she could count and a lot more blood than she wanted to see. 

“He’s dead. It’s in his chest, there’s really nothing that we can do for him, right?” she asked, sadly looking back up at Yinsen and silently wondering why he was still trying.

“It’s not that simple,” Yinsen said, as he put another large piece of metal into the bottle in her hand, “Raza wants him alive. If we don’t keep his heart beating…” He didn’t need to finish the threat. “Listen, the metal will be forced up and into his heart, we have maybe hours or days before this happens, but I need you to find a way to make sure that it stays clear of it, since some of the pieces are too small to remove.”

“What do you suggest that I do? If the pieces are too small for you to get, then how the hell am I supposed to do it? Make them magically disappear?” Lyra said sarcastically, starting to panic.

“I didn’t say that you had to remove them,” Yinsen said, still calm, “Just keep them away from his heart. Know of anything that will keep metal away from places where you don’t want?”

“A magnet? There’s no way that we could fit something like that into his chest and expect him to live.”

“We must do something, or he’ll die.” Yinsen said simply. “I don’t have the knowledge of magnetics to create something like this on such short notice, but I might know a way to get it inserted and we have enough sterile metal to get the job done.”

Lyra bit her lip, her mind already racing with a billion possibilities. “Who is this anyway, that’s so important…” she mumbled, almost to herself. She walked around Yinsen and moved his light slightly, so that she could get a good look at his face. When she did, she dropped the bottle onto the stretcher with a loud clink and gasped. The face was handsome, no doubt, even though it was pale, scraped, and bruised. She hadn’t been really expecting to recognize the man, but there was no mistaking that stupid goatee. 

“You want me to save Tony Stark?!” she said in horror. “How did they even get him? Why is he here?”

“I don’t know any more than you do. All I know is what Raza told me.”

Lyra, still not taking her eyes off his pale and strained face, said “No. I won’t do it. I refuse.”

Beside her, Lyra could hear Yinsen slowly put down the tools that he was using and turn to face her. He put both this hands on her shoulders and turned her so that she was facing him too. His calm look only flared her temper, if this didn’t get him rattled then nothing would. “It is certainly your choice whether you will do it or not.”

“You know what would happen to me if he lives, right? They wouldn’t need me anymore, I’d be signing my own death warrant,” she spat, like he hadn’t just said that she could choose. 

“Yes. If you do nothing, he will die,” Yinsen said simply and turned back to continue his work. 

Lyra wanted to wrap her hands around the older man’s neck and scream at him to stop being so calm, so rational. There was no way that that would happen, though, no matter how unreasonable he was being. Thinking about his words, she took a deep breath and again looked down at the man on the table. His eyes were closed, but his face looked to be set in an expression of pain. Hate flowed through her at the sight. This was what he deserved. Ever since she could remember there had always been Stark weapons around, killing and hurting people. People that she had loved. This was the man who was responsible for all of it. So what if he died? He wasn’t worth the parts, much less her own life. It wouldn’t matter to her at all if….

“No,” Lyra said aloud and shook her head to clear away those thoughts. They were dark and nasty thoughts that she had never thought herself capable of. In this moment she had a man’s life in her hands. Could she really just let him die like that? She scanned his face again for some sign that he deserved to die, but this time all she saw was a man that was in pain, who was dying, and she was his only chance at life. She bent down slightly so that her mouth was near his ear and, even though she knew he was far from being able to hear her, said with venom, “You’d better be worth it, Tony Stark.”

 

She worked for more than 6 hours. It was a simple thing, an electromagnet powered by a car battery. She had several dozen better ideas, but all of which would take time and materials that she didn’t have at the moment. The only thing that she took special care of was how the connecting mechanisms that were going to be in the chest were designed. She knew that any upgrades to that part would rely on these, since removing and replacing it would be yet another major surgery with an even larger chance of failure. With only her limited knowledge of biology, she relied heavily on Yinsen’s input to determine what was possible. The matter of making it was simple with what she had on hand and when it was finally done, she presented the crude machine to Yinsen. 

“It will work?” he asked, holding the decide in his hand, inspecting it. 

Lyra said nothing, a dark expression on her face.

Yinsen looked at her sternly and then indicated the box of gloves to her right. “Get cleaned up, it’s going to be a long night.”

Resigned to her fate, Lyra did as he asked. She loathed assisting him in surgeries but was occasionally required to when he needed someone. It was really just a matter of following his directions and not letting your hands slip or shake. When she was as clean as she could get, she went back to the room.

For four more hours they worked on inserting her device into Tony Starks chest. Lyra following all of Yinsen’s orders as he gave them, even when it was something like manning the bone saw or moving organs out of the way. The whole time she kept thinking that he would die any moment, but the beeping on the monitor continued on. At some point in the night, they ran out of anesthesia, and the man woke up and started screaming. He grabbed the front of Lyra’s shirt and yanked on it, hard. She screamed and Yinsen called for more help. Armed men burst through the door and Yinsen yelled at them to hold him down. Eventually, though, he passed out from the pain and stress anyway, and Lyra was left with the memory of the crazy look in his eyes. They continued on with the procedure, screwing the bolts into bones and then closing up. 

“If the surgery didn’t kill him, then an infection will,” Lyra stated, as she took off her gloves and facemask. 

“Have faith,” Yinsen said, doing the same. “The longer he lives, the greater the chance that he will live longer.”

Lyra shook her head, still second-guessing her choice to help. 

Suddenly the door burst open, causing both of them to jump. Two more heavily armed men walked into the room, followed by Raza himself. He scanned the room with the authority of a man in command and then said, “Give me news of the patient.” Lyra strained to hear his voice, Yinsen had only began teaching her the language and it was one she struggled with. 

“He’s alive, recovery will take a while, I suggest that you don’t—” Yinsen was cut off as Raza held up a hand.

“Take him.”

Yinsen tried to protest more, but Lyra put a hand on his arm. She knew that once Raza had made up his mind there was nothing that could be done to change it. The two armed men lifted Tony Stark up by the arms and dragged him out of the room, with Raza following. Lyra and Yinsen looked at each other for a moment and then headed out of the room as well, but instead of following Raza further, they made their way back into their room in silence escorted by the rest of the guards that had assisted with the surgery. Neither of them really felt like talking. 

Knowing that sleep would elude her, Lyra took some of the alone time to keep scribbling down ideas that she had for the chest piece, not having anything else to really focus on. Yinsen sat in a corner reading a book. After what seemed like a lifetime the door burst open and both Lyra and Yinsen jumped to their feet, arms behind their heads like they were trained. The two men who had dragged the half dead body out of the other room, returned with it, then dumped it onto the floor. 

“Keep him alive, Raza’s orders,” one of the men said and then they left. 

Yinsen strode over to the slumped figure and, reaching down, called to Lyra, “Help me with him, would you?”

Making a clear face of disgust she walked over to Yinsen’s side and grabbed a shoulder. Between the two of them, they got the man to lie down on Yinsen’s small cot. Yinsen put a blanket over him and began to re-secure the bandages around his chest. He did some other things, but Lyra had lost interest and returned to her sketches and numbers, where she was most comfortable. A sinking dread was beginning to form in her stomach with every shaky breath she heard the injured man take. His life meant her death, she was sure of it. Was she really ready? A part of her was saying that she should have died years ago, and this was just life’s cruel and ironic way of punishing her for challenging that fate. There was nothing to do but wait now though. 

He came for her several hours later, when she had dozed off, laying her head on the desk. The door burst open again, but before Lyra could fully awaken and stand, he had grabbed a fistful of her hair and was dragging her out the door. She didn’t give him the satisfaction of her crying out, but she did manage to catch Yinsen’s eyes and gave him a silent goodbye. To her surprise, he ran after calling her name and begging Raza to let her stay, his characteristic calm finally broken. Tears came to her eyes at the sight, but she didn’t let them fall. If she was going to finally die, she would die well. At least she hoped. 

He didn’t release his grip on her hair until he reached his private quarters. Unfortunately, she knew these rooms all too well. He yanked her hair forward, sending her sprawling onto the floor and he walked up and stood over her. 

“What are we going to do with you now, huh?” He said and bent down to run a finger across Lyra’s jawline. She shuddered at his touch, but didn’t shy away. She knew the game, the more that she let him know he was getting to her, the worse it would be. 

“You could always release me,” she said darkly, they were speaking Arabic, which Lyra was comfortable with. She sat up, keeping her posture straight and her chin up, keeping a cool calm. 

Raza chuckled. “And waste such a wonderful prize? No. I don’t think I’ll do that.”

“So get on with it, then.” Lyra looked straight in his eyes, teeth clenched. She retreated deep into a place in her consciousness where she could pretend that she was strong. Not afraid. She was also too familiar with this place. She got a glimmer of satisfaction when she saw the discomfort in his eyes at her lack of emotion.

“I’m not going to kill you, ” he said, returning to the ease of a man that had absolute power over her. “Your usefulness in weaponry is overshadowed, but you can be useful in… other things.” His eyes had a wicked glimmer and Lyra’s stomach sank. It wasn’t going to end like this; she wouldn’t let it. “However, it was suggested that I let you teach Stark how things are to be done around here. But make no mistake, after we know that he is ours, you will be mine. At first.” 

Revulsion crawled through Lyra’s skin and she broke eye contact, letting him win. After all this time where she had clawed and struggled her way to survive and she was seeing the end. The terrifying end. She knew what she had to do.  
Raza barked some orders and she saw a man come in. He grabbed her roughly by the arm, forcing her to her feet. He marched her outside the room and then was joined by several guards, all heading back towards her room. They pounded at the door and Lyra could vaguely hear someone talking. They entered the room and she saw Yinsen standing, with his hands behind his head, but he wasn’t alone. Tony Stark stood next to him, looking confused and afraid. She simultaneously wanted to laugh at him and punch him in the face. The man drug her up to where Abu was talking and then let go of her and retreated back with the other men. She seethed up at the large man in front of her. 

“Ah, Lyra, so glad that you could join us. Enjoying your last few moments before Raza’s special treatment comes to an end?” he taunted, with a cruel smile. He had made it no secret that he despised her.

“I never enjoy seeing your ugly face,” Lyra spat at him. Rage filled his eyes and in a flash he had stepped forward and backhanded her across the face hard enough so that she fell to the ground and the taste of blood filled her mouth. Lyra twisted to look back at him and gave him a smile, that she was sure was terrifying and full of blood. However, her ears were ringing and the entire right side of her face felt like it was on fire. She was so focused on not blacking out that she barely heard the next few words spoken. When she finally became aware enough, she heard the sound of the door closing and then Yinsen was there, kneeling beside her and taking her face gently in his hands. 

“You should really learn to hold your tongue,” he said gently in English, turning her face to look her over. She pushed his hands away and got to her feet stubbornly. Putting her hand on her right cheek and gingerly feeling the swelling flesh, she looked around the room and settled on the unfamiliar face looking at her with surprise and pity. She glared at him.

“I can hold my tongue when I’m dead, Yinsen,” she said in Arabic.

“What’s she saying? What just happened?” Tony demanded, looking between the glaring girl and the doctor. He looked concerned. “Does she not speak English?”

Before Yinsen could answer, Lyra decided that it was time to vent. Switching to Russian, she said, “You motherfucking asshole, you can take your pity and shove it up your playboy—” She was ready to keep going all night, but Yinsen interrupted her. 

“Lyra, you know that it is rude to speak in a language that not everyone can understand,” he chastised in English, knowing full well the extent of your colorful Russian vocabulary.

“Fine,” she said in English this time, then she walked up to Tony and spat, “Go to hell!” Feeling a little better at the surprise and confusion on his face, she stalked over to her desk, out of view from either of them and sat down. She put her face in her arms and finally let the stress and the fear silently wash over her. She could very clearly hear the conversation across the room.

“Um, who is she and why does she hate me?” Tony asked, in confusion. Watching the spot that she disappeared to. 

“She’s the technology expert here. They tell her what they need and she makes it.”

“So what’s with the hate? Shouldn’t I be, like, her idol or something?”

“Look around you, Stark. What do you see?”

There was a pause. Tony looked around and saw piles of discarded boxes and parts, most of which had a very familiar logo.

“She’s a prisoner here, much like yourself,” Yinsen continued, “but she looks around every day and sees—"

“Stark Industries.” Tony finished blankly. 

“Don’t judge her too hard,” Yinsen said gently and from across the room Lyra gritted her teeth to stop herself from yelling at Yinsen for defending her.

“So now what? I’m not building them the missile and—” Lyra couldn’t help herself after she heard that, she let out a scoff, louder than she meant to.

She didn’t know why they hadn’t taken him right away, but just then several men entered the room and drug Tony out with them. She dared a look across the room and saw him clutching onto his car battery as someone pushed him out the door and closed it with a slam. There was a sound of slowly approaching footsteps and Lyra looked up to see Yinsen, looking down at her with undisguised concern. She knew that she was acting slightly more reckless than usual and she didn’t meet his gaze. Instead, she silently wrapped her arms around his middle and pressed her face into his stomach. His arms circled around her and they stayed like that for a long while. 

 

Lyra was lying awake in her cot when they brought him back, still clutching onto this battery and soaking wet. He walked into the room and then collapsed onto his knees and took long, shaky breaths. Immediately Yinsen was over next to him, checking to see that he wasn’t hurt too badly. Yinsen brought him to his feet and then led him over to the other cot in the room, covering him with a blanket. He didn’t look like he was ready to talk. His eyes were far away while he processed where he truly was and what the stakes were in this game. Eventually, they wandered over to Lyra, sitting on the cot across the room. She was staring at him, with an expression of pity and understanding. 

Eventually she realized that they were sharing eye contact and looked away. He thought he saw her blush, but it was hard to tell in the dim lighting. He took a moment to more fully look her down. She was young, almost a child. He hadn’t noticed before because the grim expression and cold eyes had made her look years older, despite her petite size. It was no surprise that she looked underfed, dirty, and pale, but if he looked further he could see that underneath it all she could be pretty under different circumstances, with her big brown eyes and her brown hair fastened up into a loose bun. She was either brave or crazy, he decided, remembering the way that she had stared down the man called Abu and how she had yelled at him when they met. After what he had just gone through he thought that she must be crazy, because no one could go through this and still resist doing what they wanted. He didn’t blame her, though, she never should have had to go through this. If he was still alive tomorrow he decided that he would try to find out more about her.

Tony was asleep when they came for him next, though he had no idea how he had managed that. Lyra was working at a dimly lit desk, hunched over some papers and he didn’t see Yinsen. They came through the door and pushed him out like before, leaving Lyra and Yinsen alone again. 

“They’ll get to him,” Lyra said, matter-of-factly, watching the door.

“He hasn’t broken yet,” Yinsen pointed out from across the room where he was making some food over the fire. 

Lyra shook her head. “Did you see that look in his eyes? He won’t last 10 more minutes.”

True to what she had said, it wasn’t long before a man came into the room saying that they needed a translator to strike the deal. Yinsen went, leaving Lyra alone to try to focus on her project.

 

They both returned together and settled over the fire. Yinsen started talking and Lyra walked over to them, arms wrapped tightly around her middle. She looked over Yinsen once to make sure that he was okay and could tell that the act was not lost on Tony. 

“Make a deal?” she interrupted quietly. 

“One missile and they’ll set him free,” Yinsen answered and Lyra snorted in disbelief. They shared a look. 

“What was I supposed to do?” Tony argued and Lyra and Yinsen stared at him quietly as he defended himself from an imaginary attack. “They’re going to get what they want anyway, what was it that you did again?” His accusation stung and he could tell from the look in Lyra’s eyes. 

“I do what I have to do to survive, I don’t owe anyone anything,” Lyra said, but didn’t look at all convinced about what she was saying. 

“Lyra has modified some weapons, yes, but they don’t think her capable of doing much. You, however, made them the weapons in the first place; they’re going to expect you to do more,” Yinsen said. 

“I didn’t make weapons for them,” Tony said bitterly, looking up at Yinsen.

“They have them all the same, Tony.”

“It’s not my fault, I have no idea where they got them from.”

“That’s even worse,” Lyra murmured coldly, then stared straight into Tony’s eyes, “You’re too busy sleeping with women and figuring out where the next party is, while people are suffering and dying because of you. You..” she trailed off, it was the first time that Tony had really seen her show any emotion other than spite. Her eyes were wet with both anger and sadness, but she turned away before he could really get a good look. 

“Your life’s work, in the hands of those murderers,” Yinsen said, recapturing Tony’s attention. “Is that how you want to go out? Is this the last act of defiance of the great Tony Stark? Or are you going to do something about it?”

“Why should I do anything? They’re going to kill me, you, her, either way. And if they don’t, I’ll probably be dead in a week,” Tony replied, looking defeated. 

“Well then, this is a very important week for you, isn’t it?”

Tony looked up at Yinsen, and then stared at Lyra’s back as she walked over to her side of the room. Everything was looking so hopeless, what right did they have to make him feel guilty about any of this?

 

The three of them didn’t get very much sleep that night, all lost in their own thoughts about what would come the next day. When it did come, it was time to get started and people filed in, waiting for a list of what Tony needed. He sat down at Lyra’s desk and started writing on paper. He knew exactly what he would need to make another Jericho missile from scratch. He was a little more than halfway through when a hand reached down and snatched the list from under him. He looked up to see Lyra reading the paper, with a scowl on her face. 

“Hey, I’m not done yet,” he protested, reaching back for it.

Easily holding the paper just out of reach, she read, “Advanced targeting microchips, pure filtered palladium, casting equipment. Are you kidding me?”

“Don’t think I know what I need to make a missile?” 

“I don’t think you quite understand your position, Mr. Stark,” she said, exasperated. “You could get all this stuff if you were a rich industrialist, but here different militaries restrict all of these things.”

“I am a rich industrialist, darling,” he said, attempting a weak smile. Lyra cursed in Arabic and then threw the list back at him. 

“Not here you’re not. And you’re going to have to listen to me. Most of your other weapons will have the different components that you will need. Finish your list and then I’ll translate it and make it into something that we can actually use.”

“I know what’s in my weapons,” he said, now a little bit angrily.

“Whoa, a miracle! He actually does know something about his own weapons!” Lyra said in mock awe.

“Why even help me at all?”

Lyra thought about it for a moment as he watched her, then said, “Truthfully? Because I feel sorry for you.”

He was taken aback by her statement, and the look in her eyes. This girl, this prisoner, felt sorry for him? What could she possibly have that he didn’t? If anything, he should feel sorry for her, but with her sharp tongue and touchy temper it was hard to. She turned and walked away while he thought for a moment. He eventually went back to his list, scratching off some of the things and replacing them with either weapons or small things that he was reasonably sure that they could produce for him. When he was done he brought it to Lyra, who took it without comment. She scanned it quickly and replaced one or two things. When she was done she handed it to Yinsen, who also scanned it and then walked over to the metal door and knocked. The door was opened and he handed the list out to them. 

“What now?” Tony asked, looking between Lyra and Yinsen. 

“They’ll take a moment to go over it and verify it, then they’ll gather supplies and bring them,” Lyra said, settling down at her desk and pulling out her own papers. Tony walked up behind her, which she was very aware of, but didn’t show. 

“Whatcha working on, Cinderella?” he asked, then looked down at her papers, which at the moment mostly consisted of numbers and proofs. He looked surprised. Lyra shifted an arm over the paper, blocking it from view. 

“Nothing particularly important,” she said, amusing herself. 

“Lemme see,” he said and reached out quickly for the paper under her. Instinct took over, and Lyra shied away from his gripping hands, hating herself for it the moment that it happened. Realizing what just happened, Tony retreated, taking a step back from her. “Just curious,” he mumbled and then walked away.

He looked around the room and saw that Yinsen had been watching the entire exchange. He decided to go talk to him.   
“What’s her story?” he asked quietly, settling himself by the fire next to the older man. 

“Why don’t you ask her yourself?” Yinsen replied calmly.

“She’s a little intimidating,” Tony said throwing a glance back in her direction.

Yinsen chuckled. “An easy thing to think. She’s been here for almost a year. Before that, I don’t know she doesn’t like to talk very much about it. I think it was probably worse where she was, she was in a bad way when she was brought to me.” Yinsen shrugged, his eyes far away at the memory. “She likes to think that she’s given up hope for anything better, but I still see it in her eyes sometimes.”

Tony listened to Yinsen quietly, thinking about how hard it had been to be here for a few days and trying not to imagine what she had been through to be here for as long as she had.

“But, things progress. You coming here is going to change everything for her, no doubt,” Yinsen said, looking straight into Tony’s eyes in that way that told him something horrible was going to follow.

“Why’s that?” he dared to ask.

“Think about it Stark. She was their weapons expert, the only one that had a chance at understanding Stark tech. It made her useful. For all her talk of not caring about people, I know she often did less than she was capable of on her projects. Now that they have you, though—”

“What do they need her for,” Tony finished Yinsen’s thought, horror slowly dawning on him. He turned to find her, only to see that she had crept up to the fire next to them. Tony opened his mouth to say something and then closed it again. 

“Lovely conversation,” Lyra said, sarcastically. Then she shoved all of her papers at Tony, finally done with her project.

“What’s this?” Tony asked, picking up the papers and turning them to look more clearly at them. 

“Something that will keep you alive,” Lyra answered monotone.

Tony started reading through the papers in her neat, small handwriting. “A new chest piece,” he murmured to himself and then looked at it for a long time while Lyra walked over to sit next to Yinsen and rest her head on his shoulder. 

“Self sustaining?” Tony asked uncertainty, still flipping through the design. 

“Very nearly,” Lyra answered.

“That’s impossible,” Tony stated.

“The math is all there. You’re the one who invented it.”

When he looked again, he saw the math that it was based off of: his design for the arc reactor back home. But the final drawings were far too small to be possible. Doubtfully, Tony kept flipping through, looking at all the familiar but advanced proofs and watching as they slowly got more and more manipulated until they found the final parameters that would work. He searched for a mistake somewhere, because there had to be a mistake. If this were true, then this little girl had just revolutionized energy as the world knew it. The design was for a small, low wattage power source. Conservative. Just enough to power the magnet in his heart for a lifetime. However, the applications for this were limitless. Scaled up, this technology could power buildings, cities, even…

“Got a pen?” he asked, and when Yinsen handed him one over the fire, he began crossing things out and scribbling his own math down. 

“It’ll work,” Lyra said, almost defensively. 

“It will, but you’re not thinking big enough dearie,” Tony muttered absentmindedly, ignoring the sour look she gave him at the nickname. An idea was beginning to form in his mind. 

 

After a while of writing and planning, there was a knock at the door and once they were all standing in view, it opened and men started walking in with boxes and crates, placing them down and then going back for more. Tony stood up and, holding the car battery said, “No! Not there, I need things organized, and I need more materials.” When no one appeared to understand him, he turned to Yinsen and Lyra and said, “I’m going to talk and you’re going to translate for me for a moment, got it?” Without giving them a chance to answer, he started giving orders rapid fire, which Yinsen started translating and Lyra joined in, amazed that they were doing just as he asked. 

That was the start. From the orders and extra materials that he asked for, Lyra could tell that he was planning on building her design, though modified. The room was a flurry of activity for a while as they set up the way that Tony specified. Eventually they left and the trio were once again left to their own devices. Though this time it was Tony who was bent over a desk working on paper while Lyra sat next to Yinsen at the fire making food. Her project was finished. After a while, Tony called her over and asked her a few questions about her design and then showed her his revisions. She took the papers and squinted, thinking that she was seeing it wrong.

“Why on Earth would you need that much power?” she asked, letting curiosity get to her. 

“Will it work?” he asked, though the question didn’t sound like he was unsure of himself at all. 

She glared at him for a second before saying uncertainly, “It should.”

“Then let’s get to work.”

They argued for a moment while they split the tasks, though Lyra did appreciate that Tony never asked if she was capable of doing something, just assumed that she could. It had been a while since she had someone who understood that she knew what she was doing when it came to technology. Someone that she could argue with and who saw her as an equal. It made her happier than she would admit. 

They worked for a few days with Yinsen helping out where he could. Though Lyra was not entirely comfortable with Tony, she was getting better, but she did avoid any personal questions thrown her way and he avoided what his plans were for the upgraded arc reactor that they were building. He just kept to himself and worked on his own designs. While Lyra hated him in principle, it was hard not to be impressed with how smart the man was. She could tell that he was thinking the same thing. 

They finished more quickly than Lyra would have thought and when he first turned it on she found it hard to look away from the beautiful brightness of the small piece of technology. She had a depressing thought that it might be the last thing that she ever built. 

An impatient call snapped her back to reality and she looked over to see that Tony and Yinsen had moved over to another table and were waiting for her. She slowly walked over. He slapped some papers onto the table and Yinsen picked them up. “This is our ticket out of here,” Tony said and then looked Lyra straight in the eyes. She walked over to stare at the papers over Yinsen’s shoulder.

“What is it?” he asked, looking at the partial drawings. 

“Flatten them out and look,” Tony said, then did just that. Lyra and Yinsen looked at the picture that had formed wordlessly for a few seconds. 

“This is what the arc reactor is going to power, then we’ll fight our way out.” There was a long pause. “Well, what do you think?” he asked Lyra. 

“I think that you’re going to get us all killed, or worse,” Lyra said, rolling her eyes.

“No, I’m not giving up. I’m going to get us all out of here,” Tony said, very seriously looking her straight in the eye again. For just a second he thought he saw a flicker of hope in her eyes, but it was gone so fast that he questioned whether it had truly been there or not.

“There’s no point,” Lyra said ominously and then walked back over to the fire.

Tony looked after her, then turned to Yinsen, who shrugged. 

“You’ll help me right?” Tony called to her. 

“Yeah,” Lyra responded, poking the fire with a stick, “but only because you don't really have a chance without me, but you'll do it anyway. I don't have much of a choice here.”

“That’s all I’m asking for.”

 

After they ate, Tony and Yinsen sat down to play some backgammon after Lyra said that she didn’t want to play. She sat next to them and watched, though her thoughts were far away. 

“You two still haven’t told me where you’re from,” Tony said, rolling the die again. 

“I’m from a small town called Gulmira,” Yinsen answered, “It’s actually a nice place.”

After a pause Tony looked up at Lyra, who was biting her lip, looking uncertain. “Chicago,” she said finally, “That’s where I was born.”

“Ah, a US citizen then. What’s with the accent?” Tony asked and she hated how casual he sounded, like they were friends.

“I’ve been all over. I haven’t spoken much English in a very long time,” Lyra said anyway.

“Where does a Chicago girl learn to speak so many languages?”

“Yinsen has been teaching me,” Lyra answered. He appreciated that she was talking to him, he’d been less than successful when asking her other personal questions. 

“Family?” Tony asked and Lyra shook her head saying, “Dead.”

Yinsen put his hand on top of hers and they shared a look before they realized that Tony was looking at Yinsen now. 

“Yes, and I will see them when I leave here,” Yinsen responded. Lyra threw him a dirty glare, leaving Tony more than a little confused. However, she said nothing.

“And you, Stark?” Yinsen asked conversationally. 

He looked uncomfortable, “No.”

“No? So you are a man who has everything… and nothing,” Yinsen mused. This time it was Tony’s turn to glare at Yinsen. The two of them seemed to be making it their life mission to make him feel guilty about his life and the worst part was they were clever enough so that he never had anything to say back. Or maybe it was just that they were right and he should feel guilty. The trauma and stress of this place was getting to him already and he had barely been there.

Similarly to when they made the arc reactor, the three of them split up the workload for the suit. It would go much faster with the three of them all hard at work. During this time, Lyra found herself getting more and more comfortable with Tony being around, which was something that she had never thought would happen. They seemed to think alike, which repulsed her, but she also noticed a huge change in him as the days went along. Before, she could see that the man was every inch the billionaire who had gotten everything that he had ever wanted; he would complain about little things and was sure of himself at every turn. After a few weeks of being with them, he understandably got tougher, but not only that, he got kinder, more aware of what was going on around him. He still smiled and joked a lot, which Lyra did not understand, but she was learning that that was just how he coped with hardship. He also listened to her more after several debates ended in her being right, which she was not going to complain about. 

 

“Yinsen, hand me some bearing balls please,” Tony said, reaching out and not looking. 

“The little ones?”

“Yeah.”

There was the sound of many impacts hitting the ground and then Lyra looked up to see Tony, right before he slid and fell face first onto the floor, taking the table down with him. 

“Not what I was asking for, Yinsen,” Tony said, covered in papers and equipment. Then he heard an unfamiliar sound and looked up to see that Lyra was laughing. His initial reaction was to be angry, but before he could vocalize that anger, he got a good look at her. A genuine smile touched her lips and her eyes were almost lit up. He saw that the suppressed beauty that he had noticed before came out in full force when she smiled. It seemed to take years off of her face and he was painfully reminded again of how young she was under all her bravado. She caught his stare and quickly wiped the look off of her face. He supposed it wasn’t smart to advertise beauty for a woman in her position. Just the thought of what had been done to her made him want to punch somebody. He was going to get her out of here if it killed him. 

 

It had been three months since Tony had arrived at the cave when there was a pounding at the door and Raza walked in. The three of them had been working day and night, barely sleeping trying to get the suit done. As a result, they were all haggard, tired, and unwashed. Raza walked toward them, looking each one down with an expression of distaste. 

“Relax.”

They put their arms down and Raza approached Tony to examine his chest piece saying, “The bow and arrow was once the pinnacle of weapons technology. It allowed the great Genghis Khan to Rule from the Pacific to the Ukraine. An empire twice the size of Alexander the Great and four times the size of the Roman Empire. But today, whoever holds the greatest Stark weapons rules these lands, and soon it’ll be my turn.”

As he spoke he wandered the room, examining all of the equipment and papers around him. The three of them exchanged worried glances, wondering just what he was getting at. 

Raza walked up to Tony and stared him down, then said in Urdu, “Why have you failed me?” It was obviously for Yinsen or Lyra. 

“We’re working,” Yinsen answered before Lyra could, “Diligently.”

“I let you live. This is how you repay me?”

“It’s very complex. He’s trying very hard.”

“On his knees,” Raza ordered and immediately men were there, grabbing his forearm and shoving Yinsen down. “You think I’m a fool? I’ll get the truth.”

“We’re all working,” Yinsen said, trying not to show that he was nervous. Lyra kept looking between the two, a fierce expression on her face. 

Raza walked to the oven and using a pair of tongs pulled out a red coal. “Open your mouth,” he ordered ominously. Tony spoke up now, asking what was happened. Slowly Raza forced Yinsen’s head down onto an anvil and held the coal up to his face. “You think I am a fool. What’s going on? Tell me the truth.”

At this point Lyra stepped forward, speaking quickly in Urdu, on the edge of yelling, “What else could he tell you? That’s what we’re doing!” Two men grabbed her before she could take another step, almost effortlessly holding her back and she struggled. 

“He’s building your Jericho,” Yinsen answered, keeping his eyes on the coal in front of him. 

“Tell me the truth.”

“He’s telling the truth,” Lyra yelled. 

“Tell me the truth!” Raza yelled now and Yinsen and Lyra both answered in like. 

“What do you want? A delivery date?” Tony asked and stepped forward. A lot of yelling and gun pointing followed and Tony took a step back. Everyone was listening to Tony now. 

“I need him,” Tony said. “Good assistant.”

Raza dropped the coal and glared around the room. Then he walked forward to where Lyra was being held and then slapped her across the face then bent down so that their faces were inches apart. 

“What are you doing here?” he asked. 

“We are building your Jericho missile, sir,” Lyra said, emphasizing the formal term.

Raza let out a yell and then grabbed a fistful of her hair, again pulling her toward the door. This time she struggled, but there was no chance of getting free. To her surprise, both Yinsen and Tony started walking toward her, yelling, but they were forced back again by more yelling and several guns pointed at them. Raza drug Lyra out the door and the men followed, closing the door with a bang. 

“Where are they taking her, what are they going to do?” Tony asked Yinsen frantically. 

Yinsen didn’t answer, just stared at the door. The expression on his face said everything. 

“We have to do it now. Go get her,” Tony said, then Yinsen spun around to face Tony. 

“No. We keep working. It’s not ready yet,” Yinsen said, firmly. “She’ll come back to us.”

 

They proceeded to spend several tense hours trying to work, but barely getting anything done. They were so close. The two of them jumped right to their feet when they heard the door open and then close again. A small figure came into sight, saying, “Relax, it’s just me.” Tony could have cried hearing her voice, though it was quiet and shaky. They both rushed over to her. She was standing near the door, soaking wet, arms wrapped around her middle. The first thing Tony noticed was that her hair was unbound, he’d never seen it that way before it was brown, thick, and went down to her waist. Seeing her with her hair down, dripping wet she looked a lot younger and smaller than he had previously seen her. Several bruises were beginning to form on every inch of showing skin. He could hear her take shaky, wheezy breaths as they stared at her. She wouldn’t meet their eyes. 

“We have twenty-four hours,” she said quietly, looking like just speaking was a lot of effort. Tony was amazed that she was even still on her feet. As if Yinsen had realized the same thing, he slowly walked up to her and put an arm around her middle, guiding her toward the fire. He sat her down and then draped every blanket around her shoulders. He wiped away some of the blood and water from her face tenderly. She allowed him to do whatever, as she blankly stared at the fire.

 

Seeing that she was alive and knowing now that they had a deadline, Tony and Yinsen continued to work at a fierce pace, picking up the last of Lyra’s work as well. Once it looked like they were going to make it, Tony dared to approach the fire. Both had heard when Lyra had started to cough, it didn’t sound good, but that had only made them work faster. Her best, and only chance was if they got her out of there. When he got to her, he offered her some water, which she looked at for a moment and then took. Taking a tiny sip and then handing it back. Still not satisfied, Tony sat down next to her. He was silent for a short moment, before he uncharacteristically reached his arm around her. She seemed surprised for a second, but then, to his surprise, she leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder. Her face was hot, but she was shivering, and he could feel her labored breaths. He held her for a long time like that, trying to convey without words what he was feeling. Somehow, he knew she understood. The two of them sharing a comradery that few others knew. Eventually she drifted off to sleep and he shifted, with the intention of letting her lay down next to the fire. As he moved, she started and gasped, pulling away from him for a second before she remembered the situation. Giving him a weak, apologetic smile, she let him get to his feet and then laid back down. 

She awoke again to Yinsen gently calling her name. 

“It’s time to start the startup procedure,” he said when she stirred. Feeling rested, but still sore and horrible she pulled herself to her feet. This was it; it was do or die right now. She needed to be sharp. 

Yinsen was already getting Tony ready to go into the suit. Over the past month they had developed a plan, full of holes, but it was the best one that they could put together. They had gone over it so many times that she knew every word by heart. As per her part, she approached the computer and started entering the commands that they would need to load up the coding that would be put into the assembled suit. She trusted that they had finished her work for her while she slept. The three of them were all business for a while as they prepared. Lyra lost herself in coding, then went to help Yinsen get the rest of the equipment onto Tony. 

Suddenly she heard a voice calling their names through the door. It was too soon. Yinsen yelled something back and then a moment later there was a huge explosion that left Lyra’s ears ringing. She continued to work, going back to the computer to start the upload. They were running out of time. 

“We need more time,” Yinsen said, snapping Lyra back to awareness. “Hey, I’m gonna go buy you two some time.”

“No!” Lyra said and grabbed onto his arm.

Yinsen gently pulled her hand away from him with a look that made her heart sink and ran away from them as Tony yelled at him to keep to the plan. Lyra choked back a sob as she saw him disappear, but then she quickly went back to work, finishing bolting the suit to Tony and doing the last system check. They heard gunshots and yelling from outside the door. When the final program started running, the computer drew the power from out of the lights. 

“Lyra, get to the safe zone. Then wait for me to clear it. Do you hear me?” Tony yelled, his voice strained and pleading. 

Lyra, didn’t answer, just did as he asked, running across the room to the corner and sitting down, curling herself up, silent tears running down her face. She listened to the sounds of yelling and gunshots, all too close, but also the mechanical whir of Tony’s movement. There was nothing for her to do but wait now. As Tony walked for the exit the sounds got more and more distant. After a while of no close movement, she couldn’t take it anymore and crept out of her hiding space and to the door. Silently following Tony’s path and trying not to look too hard at the crumpled bodies that littered the floor. She heard Tony call out Yinsen’s name, followed by an explosion and then a quiet conversation. Creeping up and looking around the corner she saw Tony leaning over Yinsen, and with a cry of surprise she ran over to kneel beside him. 

“It’s okay. I want this,” Yinsen said quietly, and then turned to Lyra and ran his thumb over her face, catching a tear. “I want this.”

“Thank you for saving me,” Tony said. 

“Don’t waste it. Don’t waste your life,” Yinsen murmured, fading. “Take care of each other.”

“Yinsen,” Lyra said, her voice thick with despair and his hand fell away from her face. “Yinsen!” she yelled, crying now. She put her hands on either side of his face, searching for signs that what she thought wasn’t true. When she didn’t see anything she very gently closed his eyes, placed a kiss on the man’s forehead, and then put her own forehead to his chest, sobbing. 

Tony just watched her, through tears of his own. Her grief seemed to fill the room and wrapped itself tightly around his chest. Yinsen’s last words echoed in mind over and over again. His heart filled with rage after a second. They would pay, everyone here would. He turned to Lyra and put a gloved hand on her back. 

“We’ll have time to be sad later, Lyra. We have to move on, keep going,” he said, surprised at how steady his voice sounded. “I’m going out, but you have to promise that you’ll be ready when I give the signal to come out.” When she didn’t respond, he forcefully grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her to face him. “Promise me.” 

“I promise,” Lyra murmured through tears. 

With vengeance pounding through his veins Tony walked out of the cave to heavy gunfire. After a moment he let the flamethrowers loose, covering the camp and ensuring that a majority of the weapons were aflame. When he had stayed as long as he dared, Tony turned back and headed to the cave. 

“Lyra!” he called and was relieved when she was there next to him a moment later. The gunfire had mostly stopped, but he hovered over her protectively anyway. He flipped a few switches on his arm and then grabbed onto Lyra. When she realized what he was doing her eyes went wide and she said, “Wait, no that’s not—” It turned into a scream as the jets engaged and they were both swept up. Tony tilted his body so that they kept low as he blasted away from the base with Lyra clutching at him, screaming. As he felt the jets failing he was able to turn at the last moment, so that he took the brunt of the impact with the sand, though he was sure hers wouldn’t feel much better. They both skidded and rolled and Tony felt a bulk of his armor detach from him. When he finally stopped, he shrugged the rest of the armor off. “Not bad,” he said, mostly to himself. 

“Lyra!” he called out suddenly.

“Here,” he heard her call back miserably from a few yards away. 

Slowly getting to his feet even though his head was spinning, he made his way over to where he heard her voice come from. To his relief, she was sitting, brushing sand out of her hair. 

“You’re an idiot,” she said angrily and he laughed, earning himself a glare. When she shakily got to her feet he pulled her into a hug, which she let happen, but didn’t return.

“What’s the plan now? We’re in the middle of the desert with nothing. What are we supposed to do?” she said, still angry. 

“We’re going to keep moving. And hope that the right people find us. Can you walk?” Tony asked innocently. 

Lyra snorted unhappily and Tony noticed that she wasn’t putting any weight on her left foot. Gingerly, she put it down and let it take some weight. With a grimace she took a few steps and assessed herself for any other injuries. Tony watched her, painfully aware of her pale, gaunt face and malnourished, bruised body. He hoped that he had made the right choice because she certainly wasn’t going to last very long out here. 

“Lead the way, your highness” she said snarkily, putting on her brave face.

Tony started walking in a direction that he was pretty sure was away from where they had come. Lyra followed behind him, struggling to keep up. They walked for what felt like forever and while Tony thought that Lyra might collapse any moment, she kept walking on, again showing Tony her iron core.

He was about to tell her that they were stopping when he heard the helicopters behind him. Looking up, he recognized American models and excitement filled his chest. He yelled and waved, even though he was sure that they had seen him. When they turned for him he fell to his knees, laughing like a madman in relief and happiness as the nightmare’s end was in sight. The helicopter landed and men ran out. Tony was even happier to see Rhodey running towards him.

“How was the fun-vee?” he said, and Tony couldn’t help but smile. Rhodes knelt down and place a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Next time you ride with me, okay?” Tony laughed and his friend pulled him into a hug.

Tony was still trying to convince himself that Rhodes was real when he heard Lyra behind him.

“Tony?” she called out, clearly and calmly. 

He turned to see the other men approaching Lyra where she was sitting, guns aimed at her.

“Hey, she’s with me!” Tony called out, then scrambled to his feet. The men looked at Rhodes, who nodded, seeing that she was harmless. Tony walked back up to her and offered a hand, which she hesitantly took and lifted herself up. Her eyes were wild and unsure, she looked like she was about to pick a fight. She was out of her territory and scared. 

Tony put his arms on her shoulders and said, “Didn’t I tell you I’d get you out, Lyrs?”


	2. Out of the Cave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony and Lyra escaped the captivity of the cave. What comes next for them?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I already posted some of this, but I think that splitting it into three chapters is going to be what's best for it since it's so long and I might want to add more later.

Lyra sat sideways on the seat, holding her knees to her chest. She hadn’t taken the headset that they offered her and instead stared outside. Her expression was lost. Blank. Tony stared at her, worried that she might be at her limit. He was quickly distracted by Rhodey’s questions. All the standard stuff: are you okay? Where have you been? Tony answered them simply, not really giving much detail. 

“Who is she?” Rhodey finally asked, indicating Lyra. 

“Someone amazing,” Tony said. 

They landed at the nearest outpost and Tony and Lyra were taken into a rather run-down looking building. Rhodey had warned him that there was going to be a long debriefing process. He hoped that they at least gave him time to clean up and eat something. 

As they brought her up to the building, Lyra was still uncomfortable; looking around with a determined stare. Tony knew that she was memorizing their path, counting men and weapons. He wanted to tell her to relax but knew enough about her by now to know that it would probably have the opposite effect. Another man in uniform then indicated that Lyra should split off from the group and follow some other people. She gave Tony a look like she was debating about completely ignoring the man. He put a hand on her shoulder for a moment, trying to comfort her, and then headed in the direction that he was told. Soon this would all be over, and he could be free finally. 

Lyra was taken to another makeshift building, led by a woman. She kept looking at Lyra with pity in her eyes. They walked into a small room (that Lyra checked out fully before entering) and Lyra sat on a tall metal slab that reminded her of death. A uniformed nurse walked in and told the other woman to wait outside. Lyra studied the new girl suspiciously. She looked friendly enough. 

“Just gonna check all your vitals, hon,” the woman had a southern accent. She approached Lyra, who looked distrustful and threatening. “Nothing to worry about. We’ll do a more in-depth one later, all I need is a pulse and breathing from you.” She pulled out a stethoscope. Lyra reluctantly let her place the metal on her chest and back, and gave her a hand when she asked for it. The woman frowned, wrote something on her clipboard and then said, “If you feel up to it now there’s a small shower in that room over there. You can get yourself cleaned up and then some of the officers would like to talk to you.”

Lyra walked into the little room and they closed the door behind her. A quick scan of the room didn’t yield any cameras or traps, but that couldn’t be ruled out completely. She debated on what to do for a moment, but then the thought of an actual shower overwhelmed her. Stepping out of her torn and bloody clothes she got in the shower. The water ran cold for a moment and then got warm. It was nice and comfortable, and made her relax just enough for the pain to set in. She braced her arms on the wall of the shower and shook as she cried. The pain and stress of the last few days coming out in silent tears. And through it all the tremendous loss. Yinsen hadn’t deserved that. She wished that she could take his place. He would know what to do now. He always did. She was alone. 

After letting herself cry until she couldn’t anymore, she finally finished up rinsing off and got out. She dried herself off and put on the clothes that had been left out for her. A simple black long sleeve shirt and some black kakis. She pulled her wet hair back up and looked at herself in the mirror, arranging her face back into a blank stare. When she was satisfied, she opened the door and looked around. The nurse was nowhere to be seen. In her place a young-looking soldier was standing at attention. When he saw her walk out he told her to follow him and then promptly left. Even though her body still ached from all that it had been through in the past few days, she kept his pace. 

They put her in another small room with only a table and chair. A mirror lined one side of the wall and it didn’t fool her. She sat down and put her head down on the table. Dark thoughts continued to fill her mind. Everywhere was the same. 

 

Tony positively leapt at the chance to finally take a shower, though as the water ran red with blood, both his own and Yinsen’s the experience was almost ruined. He wondered how Lyra was doing. Afterwards they led him into an interrogation room, and he was quickly followed by Rhodey and one other man that he faintly recognized but did not know. They asked him very detailed questions about the past few months, which he did his best to answer truthfully and quickly. They asked a lot about Lyra and it was clear how much Tony didn’t know about her. When he had finally told them everything the third time they all stood up. The woman from before walked in and just said, “Sir”, indicating that there was a problem somewhere that required his attention. They followed her out. She led them a few rooms over where another conversation was going on. Tony heard Lyra’s voice and recognized the tone immediately. He couldn’t help but give a small smile. At least this time it wasn’t directed at him. 

“How long were you in there?”

“How long is this going to take?”

“You do realize that not answering these questions can lead to imprisonment, young lady?”

“What else is new?”

“We are the United States government and you will answer the question.” The older man was clearly getting frustrated.

“So if I answer your question you’ll let me go?” Lyra asked sweetly, looking up at him innocently.

“It’ll certainly be a good start,” the man said, sounding slightly relieved. 

“Bullshit,” Lyra dismissed, fire in her voice, “You’re just like everyone else, murdering innocent people for some misguided sense of control.”

The man lost his temper and stood up, slamming his hands on the table. It was meant as intimidation, but Lyra didn’t flinch. Instead her face darkened as she retreated into herself. 

“You sure that this was the amazing person that you were talking about?” Rhodey asked, throwing a sideways look at Tony.

“Just give me a minute with her,” Tony said.

“I can’t do that, it—”

“You can even be in the room and everyone can watch. I just need a moment. You won’t regret it I promise.”

Rhodey and the other man looked at each other for a moment and then Rhodey indicated the door. Tony walked in, causing both of the room’s occupants to look over. 

“We’ve got this, Sanders,” Tony said and the old man walked out in a huff. Rhodey was right behind Tony. 

“Someone really needs to loosen up,” Tony said, and sat down across from her. She glared at him. “Hey, I was talking about him.” He put up his hands in defense. “Lyra, these are the good guys.” He looked into her eyes, trying to convey that he was serious.

She muttered something in another language and looked away. 

“Trust me,” Tony said, still seriously, “answer some questions, do some tests, and then we’re outta here. You just have to trust me.”

She looked back at him and he could see it in her eyes. She was scared, and alone, and a billion other different things that were making her do what came naturally: lash out. He just needed her to cool it for a moment. 

“This is my best friend, Rhodey. He’s gonna ask the questions now. I vouch for him. He’s not a murderer of innocents, I would know. On my honor.”

Lyra snorted, but he could tell she was amused. She rolled her eyes at him, and then they shifted over to Rhodey, sizing him up. Finally, she relaxed her tense position just a fraction, and Tony stood up and left. 

“What’s your name?” Rhodey asked softly. 

“Lyra Elisabeth Smith.”

“Birthday?”

“1/1/91”

Rhodey shuffled some papers and then looked up at her. 

“Social Security Number?”

“No clue,” she sounded bored. 

Tony waited outside, just out of earshot of the conversation. She would have told him about her past already if she wanted him to know and he was trying to respect that. He was just a little bit nervous because during his interview he had sort of glossed over what she had been doing there and just exactly how smart she was. He figured that she would tell them in her interview so he left that up to her. Technically the iron suit and power source were his ideas. 

When the door finally opened again Tony jumped and looked over as Rhodey exited. Tony rushed over. 

“All her answers match up with what little records we have. Place of birth and address, death of family, human trafficking sales. Her story matches yours to a T.”

“So what’s going to happen to her?” Tony asked, trying not to show his relief and was simultaneously impressed that their stories had matched. 

“I don’t know. She’s seventeen, still technically a minor. The government might try to find a home for her to stick to while she readjusts to society. This kind of thing is more common than I want to think about.”

“I’ll take her.”

“What?”

“I mean, I’ll give her a place to stay and readjust,” Tony said quickly.

“Tony, I don’t think you get it. There are people that are trained—”

“You saw how she was in there,” Tony interrupted, anticipating Rhodey’s skepticism, “She listens to me. Plus she’s already 17 so it’s not like it needs to be for long.”

“But—”

“You put her in another place, she’ll be gone by the next day. She doesn’t like people.” As he was defending the idea he became surer of it. He didn’t want her to disappear, he was just learning to tolerate her. 

Seeing the determination in Tony’s eyes, Rhodey sighed. “I hope you’re sure about this. I’ll see what I can do.”  
They had both Tony and Lyra recount their stories again that evening. There was also a more thorough medical examination and a bunch of different tests to run. Tony barely saw Lyra at all throughout the process, though when he was offered a bed he could’ve cried. Even a crappy military bed in that crappy building. But even though he felt like his body was telling him to sleep for a million years, he could barely catch any sleep that night. 

The next day was more or less the same thing. More tests and more debriefing. Then they told him that they were finally going to send him back. After everything that had happened it felt like he was dreaming as he boarded another jet heading for the states. It was a small plane and he could see that Lyra was already there. They were alone for the first time in a long time. 

“Hey,” Tony said softly, taking a seat opposite of hers. 

She was sitting in the chair, fiddling with the seatbelt and she stopped and looked up at him.

“We finally get to go back. How are you feeling?” he asked. He wasn’t really sure how to talk to her like this. Back in the cave there had always been a mission. Something to focus on. Right now he was nervous (something that happened very rarely to him), trying to figure out the best way to offer his idea to her. 

“I don’t really feel like this is ‘going back’,” she said carefully, like she was trying to put together how she was feeling herself. 

“Right, it’s probably been a while since you’ve been to America? Where are you headed? They can probably take you anywhere you want to go,” Tony said casually.

Lyra looked away from him, considering the question. “Nowhere,” she said, then realized that that wasn’t exactly and answer and quickly continued. “Really, anywhere is fine. I can figure it out.”

“Why don’t you come with me?” Tony asked, just getting it over with. “I can give you a place to crash for a while. I have a pretty cool lab in my basement that I think you’ll like and…” he trailed off, realizing that he was rambling. He looked up at her and she looked confused and surprised and Tony couldn’t help himself but to laugh, which only made things worse.

“You want me to come stay with you?” she asked incredulously.

“Well…yeah,” Tony said, “It’s probably better than being placed with some other house and told to—”

“What do you mean placed?” 

“You’re still 17 and so legally you’d still need a guardian.” Lyra’s face wrinkled in distaste. She didn’t like the idea of being under any sort of guardianship. 

“I get it, that’s not what you want and I swear that if it doesn’t work out we’ll part ways and that’s that, but just give it a chance, Lyrs. It won’t be as bad as you think it is.”

Lyra looked at him for a moment, she was trying to figure out his motive in the offer. A scan of his face showed that he was being genuine. That, and a lack of better options had her saying, “Sure. But don’t expect anything.”

Tony smiled and Lyra marveled at how genuine and childlike his happiness was. Ever since they had been rescued he had just completely relaxed and talked and joked like he didn’t have a care in the world. It intrigued her because she hadn’t seen anyone like that in a long time. Maybe she should just accept that this was the end of her nightmare and learn to relax again, but she didn’t exactly know how to do that. But that smile had seemed so genuine, maybe if anyone could help her…

“You know, when a handsome billionaire offers a place for someone they’re usually more enthusiastic about it,” Tony said, though the look in his eyes that used to be serious was now filled with a sort of self-deprecating sarcasm. 

Lyra just rolled her eyes and looked away, though he could see her start to smile as she turned. They spent the rest of the plane ride in a comfortable silence. 

They switched planes a couple of times and had to go through a rigorous customs at the US, but when they landed, Tony stood up and walked down the descending ramp with Rhodey at his side. Lyra followed slowly behind them. They were approaching two people that Lyra didn’t know, but Tony seemed to. He waved off the stretcher that was brought out for him. Lyra didn’t catch the first couple of words that Tony said to the new people because she was looking around at the airport, but then she gave them her attention when she heard her name called out. 

“This is Pepper, my assistant, and Happy, my chauffeur,” Tony said, pointing them each out. “This is Lyra, she’s going to be staying with us for a little bit.”

Lyra tried to nonchalantly observe their reactions to this. They both seemed a little suspicious of her, like she had somehow tricked Tony into something. The way they looked at her gave her the feeling that they were being protective of Tony, which she found strange. She’d never stopped to think that maybe there were people that actually cared about Tony Stark. She followed them to a car and took the back seat with Tony. Happy and Pepper got into the front. 

“Where to, sir?” Happy asked professionally.

“Take us to the hospital please, Happy,” Pepper answered immediately. 

“No.”

“No? Tony, you have to go to the hospital.”

“No is a complete answer.”

“The doctor has to look at you.”

“I don’t have to do anything. I’ve been in captivity for three months. There are two things I want to do. I want an American cheeseburger, and the other…”

“That’s enough of that,” Pepper said and Tony saw Lyra give him a side glance like she wasn’t sure where this was going either. 

“…is not what you think. I want you to call for a press conference now.”

“Call for a press conference?”

“Yeah.”

“What on Earth for?”

“Hogan, drive. Cheeseburger first.”

The car started moving and Lyra could tell that Pepper was still tense. Tony turned to her. 

“When’s the last time you had a cheeseburger?” He asked, she could tell that he was excited. 

“Um, how about never?” she answered after thinking about it for a minute. 

“Never had a cheeseburger? That’s a crime against America, we’re going to fix this right now,” Tony said and gave her a smile. She could tell that he was awkward around her now. Thinking about it, she didn’t know how to be around him either. She wasn’t quite ready to admit that they had become friends while they were together in the cave, even though he had probably earned it. 

They got to the Burger King and Tony told Happy to order about a dozen burgers, which Lyra thought was excessive, but then he handed her one and she delicately took a bite and had to admit that it was wonderful. In a crappy America sort of way. She finished the burger quickly and Tony handed her another one with a devilish smile. 

“See what I mean?” He said as she was finishing off his second. They had both been eating too much to say anything. 

“Surprisingly, yes,” Lyra said and laughed a little as she took her time with the second. After going such a long time without eating a lot she knew that she needed to not be binge eating a ton of food, no matter how good it was. She also knew that Tony was blatantly ignoring that warning from the doctors and was going to have a rough night. 

Tony snuck glances at her while she ate. She seemed to be enjoying herself for now. The plan that had been forming in the back of his mind ever since their escape was coming into light and he wanted her to be there for it. If she ran out now then his chance to prove himself would be ruined. He needed her, though he was very aware that she didn’t need him. If she could survive in those caves pretty much by herself she could get through anything he was sure of it. The next couple of hours would be very important. 

They arrived at the place of the press conference that Pepper set up and Tony kept dodging questions about what this was all about, though there were none from Lyra. She seemed content to sit and observe. He found it a little disconcerting, like she was gathering intel on the enemy. He got out of the car to camera flashes and Obadiah welcoming him home. He hugged his friend and started towards the building while talking. 

Lyra waited a minute and then when the media attention had followed Tony, she and Pepper climbed out of the car and followed. There was a lot to take in. Lyra hadn’t been in a city in a while and she found the whole thing overwhelming, but also familiar. It was a strange contradiction. 

With Pepper still eyeing her curiously, they both walked into the building and Lyra seemed too distracted for Pepper to want to start a conversation at the moment. She figured that they’d have time. When they had almost settled into a spot in the back, Pepper heard someone call her name and she looked over to see a man in a suit.

While Pepper was busy talking to someone that had approached her, Lyra was marveling at the press conference. She could tell that Tony was excited and nervous about it. She just hoped that it didn’t involve her in any way, shape, or form. That would just be too much, but she thought that Tony would know her better by now. 

“Hey, would it be all right if everyone sat down? That way you can see me, and I can… A little less formal and…”

Everyone slowly sank down and Lyra just rolled her eyes at them indulging his stupid request while she remained pretty much the only person in the room left standing. Tony caught her eye and gave her a wink.

“What’s up with the love-in?” Rhodey had walked up and stood next to Lyra. The question was obviously meant for Pepper. 

“Don’t look at me. I don’t know what he’s up to.”

Tony launched into a very thought out and prepared speech, at least to Lyra’s ears. She just stared at him as he spoke, her face expressionless. 

“And that is why, effective immediately, I am shutting down the weapons manufacturing division of Stark International until such a time as I can decide what the future of the company will be. What direction it should take, one that I’m comfortable with and is consistent with the highest good for this country, as well.” As he said it, Obadiah was pushing him off the stage and everyone was yelling questions at him. He pushed past all of the people crowding him and walked right up to Lyra. 

“Well, what do you think?” he asked, because she was still holding her poker face, though he thought that he saw amusement in her eyes, if only just a little…

Lyra stared at him for a moment longer and then burst out laughing. He hadn’t seen her like this before and he couldn’t help but have a huge grin on his face too as she struggled for breath. 

“Tony Stark you are the biggest idiot that I have ever met, and that is the smartest thing that you’ve ever done,” she finally struggled out through laugher. She could practically feel Rhodey frowning next to her, but pretty much all the cameras were pointed at Tony and it was so loud that she didn’t feel like anyone else had heard their little exchange. They walked out of the building together. 

Tony insisted that the next place they go to be the arch reactor to go look at it in full. During the short car ride there, no one really said a word, though Lyra was in a better mood than he had ever seen her. A lingering smile stayed on her lips. Thinking about it, Tony wasn’t quite sure whether she was proud of him, or joyfully anticipating watching his life fall to pieces. He had thought that they had become friends while they were in the cave, though she held her cards so close to her chest that he could never be quite sure. 

They both walked up to the arch reactor and Tony leaned on the railing casually. “Look at it,” he said, “Our saving grace. Only huge. Imagine what this one could save us from next time. Maybe some sort of giant lizard?”

Lyra raised her eyebrows at him. “You mean your saving grace. Given to you by me,” she said, though she still had a smile on. 

“By the way, where did you get the plans for this?” he asked, kicking himself for not thinking about it sooner. 

“Russia,” she said just as casually as his first comment. He waited for her to go on but she predictably didn’t. It seemed like he was going to have to pry every bit of information out of her one word at a time. This would require patience.

Lyra sat down on a raised part of the floor and then laid down, staring up at the reactor. “Can you really shut down the entire weapons division in your company like that?” she asked.

“I have the controlling interest, so technically I can do whatever I want,” he said, looking down at her. She looked confused still and he snorted. He finally found something that she wasn’t an expert in. 

“Won’t you lose money?”

“Depends on what happens next. I have a something of an idea on how to make this up,” Tony said, walking over to her and looking down. “If you’re game.”

Lyra looked like she was about to say something when a different voice interrupted and took over. 

“Well, that… That went well.” It was Obadiah. Tony straightened up and walked over to him. Lyra just sat and watched the exchange. They were talking business, which was something that she admittedly didn’t know much about. There was something strange about Obadiah, she realized as she watched him. His voice sounded familiar but they had never met before. She just chalked it off to thinking the worst of everyone. That had been a friend where she had come from, but she could feel herself starting to hope that things would be different here. That was dangerous. However, Tony seemed to be making a huge effort to impress her and she wondered why. Now that they were out of the cave she had almost expected him to get as far away from her as he could because seeing her was sure to bring up bad memories. Eventually she realized that she had been so caught up in her own thoughts that she hadn’t heard most of the conversation next to her. She tuned back in.

“I want you to promise me that you’re gonna lay low.” Obadiah said, then walked out. 

There was a moment of silence after the door closed. Lyra sat up and looked at Tony. He had followed her through her world, now it was his turn to show her his. Probably thinking along the same lines, Tony smiled and said, “Do you wanna go home now?”

 

They walked into the dark house and the lights started coming on automatically. Tony was looking around at different things that Lyra was sure that he had missed while he way away. The house was huge and definitely the nicest place that she had ever been in. 

“Welcome home sir,” a voice said, and Lyra jumped and looked around for the source. Tony chuckled like he had been expecting it and Lyra gave him a dirty look. 

“Thank you JARVIS,” Tony said, taking off his jacket and tie. 

“It’s been a long time,” the voice that Lyra assumed was called JARVIS said. “Based on news reports, I calculated your safe return at zero point two four percent.” Tony walked further into the room and Lyra followed cautiously. The sound of running water had her turn her attention to the stairs where there was a literal waterfall turning on. She looked at it with a combination of awe and disapproval. 

“Yeah, I missed you too.” Tony let Lyra look around for a moment and he approached one of his holopad windows.

“You have one thousand, seven hundred and thirteen new voice messages. How shall I categorize for you?” 

Tony swiped through a few and then said, “Delete all.”

Lyra finished looking around and walked over to Tony. 

“JARVIS, there’s someone I would like you to meet. This is Lyra. Lyra, this is JARVIS my—”

“Self-gratifying AI butler?” Lyra guessed, though she was hiding how impressed she was. She had been listening to the conversation enough to tell this it was a pretty sophisticated piece of code. 

“It is very nice to meet you Miss Lyra,” JARVIS said courteously. 

“The pleasure is all mine,” she couldn’t help but to smile excitedly at being able to interact with such an interesting AI. She stopped short when she saw Tony’s smug look, though.

“JARVIS add Lyra to all your systems. Access level alpha,” Tony said casually.

“Very well, sir.”

“You’ll have access to all of JARVIS’s systems and protocols. I’ll go over it all with you when we get the chance.”

Lyra rolled her eyes. She’d pull his code apart when she got the chance to see exactly what kind of information he was giving her. She told herself that she should really be more trusting, but it just wasn’t in her nature. There was a reason that she’d survived so long on her own and this was just another chapter. She was, however, excited to get back to code. Making weapons was not a lot of code work and that is where she enjoyed working. She was good at it. 

“Sir, I’m detecting presence of electromagnetic energy in the house,” JARVIS piped up. 

“Boot up the scanner, will you?” Tony said and then turned around and started walking toward the stairs. Lyra assumed that she was supposed to follow him, and she did. They walked down and there was a dark room. She could vaguely make out some shapes from behind the glass and she recognized some of the shapes. This must be his shop that he had been talking about. She tried not to let her excitement show. 

“Welcome to the candy store, kid,” Tony said, and with a flourish from him the lights lit up. She was so intent on seeing it that she didn’t even mock him for his extravagant showmanship. Instead, she focused on the lab and she was not disappointed. From what she could see there was everything she would ever think of. All top brand or home made of course. Everything looked new a sleek and she hadn’t been in a lab like this for such a long time. 

Tony was smiling letting her take it in. He could tell that she was trying hard not to look excited, and that somehow just made him sad. He walked over to the scanners and started getting some full body x-rays done on himself. Priority number one was getting a good look at the device that they had inserted into his chest and making any modifications that he needed now that they were back in the right century. 

“How exactly did you insert this thing? Did you bioimplant the surrounding tissue to make sure that I didn’t reject the metal?” Tony asked, snapping Lyra out of her thoughts. '

“Well, I really only did the mechanical design of the connectors, for all the biology you’ll have to ask…” she trailed off, painfully aware of the next word that she was about to say. She could see Tony’s mood change as his smile disappeared. They both shared a long look, the grief understood. 

“We can figure it out if we look at it for a while,” Tony said, going back to what he was doing and trying to lighten the mood. He didn’t get the feeling that Lyra wanted to talk about it. Like she never wanted to talk about anything. 

“I’m fairly certain that we…” Lyra proceeded to explain to him what she knew while he finished up the x-rays. She seemed eager to get off the topic of their deceased mutual friend. 

They worked on ideas and schematics for hours into the night. Tony was impressed by how well thought out the connectors of the device were. They wouldn’t have to change them at all for what they ended up wanting to do. Tony showed Lyra some of his cool designing software and holograms, which she excitedly chattered about as she picked them up even faster than Tony had. They were back onto familiar ground now, with a mission and math to discuss. They barely noticed that time was flying by until Tony looked over and Lyra had fallen asleep on one of the desks. He smiled to himself. Her sleeping on her desk wasn’t an uncommon occurrence back in the cave. Their small cots weren’t much better than the floor so he had never bothered to move her before. 

“Lyra,” he said gently, knowing by now that touching her while she was asleep was an invitation to getting jabbed in the ribs. “Lyra!” he repeated, louder this time. 

“What?” she startled awake, looking around wildly until she found him. Her eyes were still bloodshot and it didn’t look like she was fully awake yet. He wondered just how long she’d been sleeping.

“Time to go to bed,” he said casually.

“What? We haven’t finished up the simulation mock up yet. I’m still good,” she said, her words just a little slurred. She yawned into her hand and pushed some hair that had fallen from her bun out of her face.

“No reason to rush,” Tony said, smiling. Lyra was always the most corporative when she was half asleep, her sharp tongue was dulled. Though she had been rather quiet the whole day. He guessed that there was a lot of new things to take in all at once. “I’ll show you your room.”

“My what?” She asked, rubbing her eyes.

“Room. Like, place to sleep.”

“Oh. Okay,” she said and stood up. She didn’t look like she was going to run into anything and break something valuable, but Tony kept an eye on her anyway as he led her upstairs to one of the guest rooms that had barely ever been used. 

“If you need anything I’m right down the hall, or you can ask JARVIS. Bathroom’s this room right here. There’s towels and… ugh I don’t really have any clothes for you yet darn. I should’ve had Pepper run out and get something. JARVIS remind me to do that in the morning. Other than that—hey, you’re listening right? You got all that?” He asked, while she was looking around the room very much not seeming like she was paying attention to him. 

“Bathroom, right,” she said distractedly. She was looking at the room. It was big and clean and bare, but it was still the nicest place she had ever stayed in. This whole day had seemed like some sort of fairy tale. She was certain that any moment now she would wake up and be back in the cave. 

“Get some sleep,” Tony said softly and walked out of the room, presumably to his own. Lyra stood there and watched the spot that he disappeared from. This was a strange feeling. He had left the door open. She could choose to walk out of it if she wanted to. Even if the front door was locked (which she doubted) she could probably break a window and disappear into the night before Tony would even realize it. This newfound freedom was strange to her. It had been so long since she had an opportunity like this. A choice. 

Slowly and silently she crept out of the room and down the stairs. She half expected alarms to sound, or at least JARVIS to say something and blow her cover, but nothing happened as she crept along the window. She stopped to take in the view. The city down the hill was still covered in lights and full of activity even through the darkness. It stretched out as far as she could see in any direction. As she stared she realized how tiny she felt in comparison. Sure, she could choose to leave, but then what? She had nowhere to go, no one to go to. In an unfamiliar city was absolutely no money to her name. It felt cold and lonely to her. 

Then she turned around to look at the ridiculous waterfall that was still running happily next to the stairs. She thought about the CEO of a company that had very much ruined countless lives. She thought about how determined he had looked as he announced that he would be shutting down that company. How he had looked at her afterwards when he was asking for her opinion. She thought about his easy smiles and careless generosity. The way that his eyes lit up when he was talking about his favorite things. 

“Take care of eachother.”

She turned back around and climbed into the bed.

 

Lyra slept for almost fifteen hours. At least according to JARVIS when she asked him. It had been a while since she had done something like that and she indulged herself further by snuggling with the blankets for two more hours, her mind trying to sort out everything that had happened. She kept looking around the room and pulling the blankets closer as proof that it hadn’t all been a dream. She also kept running all the different ways that it could turn into a nightmare through her head. There were plenty.

When she finally stretched and got out of bed, JARVIS turned on the lights slowly and relayed date and weather information to her. Looking around suspiciously, she knew there must be cameras or sensors around for that and she made a mental note to check in JARVIS’s code for that if she was going to be staying. That was nightmare #327. She walked into the bathroom and decided against a shower, even though she recognized that she still looked terrible. However, she noticed that the couple of days of care had put some color back into her face. She pulled her hair up and walked out of the room. No one was in the hallway so she made her way downstairs, where some voices could be heard.

“—two pounds of wafers, new welding gear, and about two dozen doughnuts,” Tony was saying. He was sitting at the table, papers spread out in front of him. Pepper was sitting next to him, an impatient look on her face. Lyra got the feeling that she wore that face a lot when it came to Tony.

“Lyra! Good to see you, kid. I thought that you might’ve vanished into the night,” Tony said, smiling genuinely at her. She had a suspicion that he knew exactly how close she had been to doing just that and she felt bad. Slightly. Tony looked her up and down and then turned to Pepper and added, “Oh, and add to the list some basics for our guest. Until she decides what she wants to do herself. Clothes and what not. Lady things.” Lyra raised an eyebrow at him, but he didn’t seem fazed. “You’ll probably also want some breakfast. Or really dinner now. There’s stuff in the fridge, but you can also call my chef. He makes the best omelets. Or also you could go out. There’s this really good taco place just down the street. That is, if they’re still there. Haven’t been there in months, but…”

He continues talking and she tuned him out. She had gotten used to his babble while he was working in the cave and it usually exhausted her. She would have normally told him to shut up by now, but she was grateful for it at the moment because she had no idea what to say. She wandered over to the fridge and opened it. There were so many different foods and colorful brands inside and it occurred to her that it had been a very long time since she had had a choice on what she could eat. Nothing looked familiar, so she closed it again and spotted an apple sitting on a tray of fruit. She also realized that what she had been smelling all this time was coffee. It was familiar from a long time ago. She picked up the apple and walked over to the source of the coffee smell. 

“Cups are in the cupboard right above you,” Tony said nonchalantly from the table. 

Lyra poured herself some and then joined them at the table. Pepper was still staring at her curiously and it made her uncomfortable. After a moment of silence, Lyra looked up to see them both looking at her. 

“What?” she asked, trying not to sound as uncomfortable as she was.

“Have you been listening?” Tony asked.

“No,” Lyra said bluntly and then yawned. “Why? Was there something important?”

Tony and Pepper shared a look and then Tony gestured to the papers in front of him, saying, “These are the adoption papers. I need to go over some of this stuff with you.”

Lyra looked simultaneously stunned and confused. “My… adoption…?”

“Close your mouth, Golbat, this was the agreement, right?” Tony said, but he stared at her like he was expecting her to get mad. “I got all the paperwork rushed and waived the homestudy.”

Lyra looked down at the pages and then looked up at Tony. She could tell that his easy smile was holding worry behind it. She thought about what this would mean for her, and she resented the thought of anyone owning her, even in a loose sense. 

“It’s not like you have them your real information anyway,” Tony said, figuring that that might get a reaction out of her. It was half a guess. 

 

Lyra raised her eyebrows in surprise, but her smile was amused. “What makes you say that?”  
“These papers say that you were born in Indiana.”

“And what makes you think that I didn’t lie to you instead of them.”

“Why would you lie?”

“Fair point,” Lyra admitted. “So I lied to the government and gave them foraged documents. Doesn’t that make me a criminal?” She was waiting for his answer. It was a test to see what he would do. 

“Only if they find out. Those must’ve been some good fake records for the government to not be suspicious,” Tony said easily. Pepper was looking back and forth between them, like they were both crazy. “Didn’t you have to take the same lie detector tests that I did while we were there?”

“Lie detector tests are pretty easy,” Lyra said, still conversationally. 

“Are you two insane?!” Pepper finally spoke up. “We can’t just lie to the government. They’re the GOVERNMENT. If we get caught—”

“Pepper calm down it’s going to be okay. IF we get caught then you can just say that you had no idea,” Tony said, trying and failing to calm her down. “So about these papers. It’ll be really easy to change your name to Stark. I’d understand if you don’t want to, but we just have to sign this paper right here.”

“You want me to take your last name?” Lyra said, but when Tony looked up at her, her face was unreadable. 

“It’s perfectly fine if you don’t want to. With your family and all I’d understand—” Tony began, thinking that this was a mistake to bring up. 

“Yes. God, yes,” Lyra finally said, and gave Tony a rare genuine smile. “Smith is such an awful fake last name. I mean, honestly.”

Pepper did not look any happier about what Lyra had said. Tony looked both surprised and strangely happy.

“And then if I ever decide that I hate it everyone will remember that a Stark was the one that ruined everything,” Lyra said, because she couldn’t let him get too happy. 

“Sign here, sunshine,” Tony said and indicated a slot. Lyra signed. 

“Is that everything?” Lyra asked, looking over the papers. 

“For now, yeah.”

Lyra nodded and then finally took a sip of the coffee that was sitting in front of her. It was a the perfect temperature and tasted like liquid energy. Her eyes widened. 

“This is great…” she said before she could stop herself. 

Tony chuckled and said, “Of course. That swill that we drank in that cave was the worst.”

“I’m pretty sure that that was mostly dirt. With a little caffeine,” Lyra said, seriously enough for Tony to question whether it actually had been. She didn’t say anything more about it. 

After eating they went back down to the lab to do more tests on Tony. Lyra took the time to dig into JARVIS’s source code and make a bunch of tweaks. It was good code. She was surprised. Something even more surprising was that according to the code, Lyra had indeed been granted top tier level access, equal with Tony’s. She had kind of assumed that he would hold onto his intellectual property, but there it was. She had full control over everything that Tony did.

They began working on a better arc reactor for Tony’s chest. With all the quality ingredients at their disposal they could improve the functionality of the piece by quite a lot. Lyra had a vague sense of where he was going with all of this, but she kept it to herself and worked. After not having been working together for several days it was a surprise to Lyra just how comfortable she had become working beside Tony. It had been so long since she had had a partner that knew as much, or maybe more than she did, and she realized that she didn’t want to lose that. She also knew that what he wanted to make was going to be something that could change the world. For better or worse she hadn’t decided on that yet. 

It didn’t take long before they had a working reactor that was ready. There was just one last problem to solve. Lyra needed to be ready to remotely write and activate the code once the reactor was in place, but Tony’s hands were too big to install it. Tony had the wonderful idea to call Pepper in. Even though Pepper had started warming up to Lyra, she could tell that Pepper thought she was pushing Tony to obsessively work on their project. The installation went fine, despite some small setbacks and Tony had his new chest piece successfully installed. 

When Pepper left the room, Lyra gave Tony a look and said, “I thought you said that you didn’t have anyone at home?”

“I don’t. I didn’t,” Tony said, still looking over to where Pepper disappeared. 

Lyra smirked and Tony glared at her. She put both hands up in defense and said, “Okay, okay. So now what?”

“Now,” Tony said while tapping the glass on his chest. “We get started.”

Lyra had been more or less correct about what he wanted to do. Though the design didn’t contain any weapons to her surprise. Just a flight suit. They argued about designs and math for a couple of days before they finally picked one to try first. 

“I’m gonna go visit Rhodey, you wanna come? Get rid of all that cabin fever, see the world?” Tony said, casually sitting on the holodeck that she was working on and blocking the light. 

“No, thanks,” Lyra said, absentmindedly. She was obviously still deep in thought.

“You really need to get out more,” Tony said, still not letting her work. “Me? I’m dying over here.”

“Can you go die somewhere else please?”

“Ouch. You really are no fun.”

“Rhodey’s not going to join you on this,” Lyra said, ignoring his comment. “He’s even less fun than I am.”

Tony hopped off the table and called over his shoulder, “Not possible. I’ll prove you wrong. See you in a few hours.” 

Lyra rolled her eyes and went back to work. 

 

“Dummy, look alive. You’re on standby for fire safety. Lyra, you roll it. Keep the camera steady. Okay. Activate hand controls. We’re gonna start off nice and easy. We’re gonna see if 10% thrust capacity achieves lift.”

“That’s too much,” Lyra muttered under her breath, but Tony ignored her. He was confident in his math. 

“And three, two, one.”

Tony immediately flew up like he wanted. Right into the ceiling when there was nothing to stabilize him and then fell straight down onto the floor. To add insult to injury Dummy also covered him in fire protecting foam. Lyra ran over and gave him a good look as he was pushing himself onto his knees. They shared brief eye contact and then Lyra burst into laughter, the camera still rolling. 

“Okay, so maybe it was too much. Turn the damn camera off,” Tony muttered, still obviously in pain. 

“Right…. right,” Lyra said between breaths as she tried and failed to stop laughing. “We need… flight stabilizers… that you can control.” She turned the camera off and wiped the tears from her face. “Can we use my math now? I told you you’d need to account for the center of mass even in a small sustained flight.”

Tony muttered something that Lyra couldn’t hear, though by his face she had a pretty good guess what it was. She looked down at him, with a big smile still on and then she wiped some of the foam out of his hair. He looked back up and couldn’t help but to also grin. Her happiness was contagious.

The next week or so was Tony designing and making the stabilizers and simultaneously working on the rest of the suit. Tony had several meetings that he had to attend, but Lyra worked on the code and interface almost 24/7. Pretty much the only breaks were when Tony would insist that they go out and get food. He tried to get her to appreciate quality food like she did coffee, but she just ate as much as her stomach would allow and told Tony that after years of eating awful food there was no room for her to be picky with what she ate. She was, thankfully, gaining weight from the scrawny underfed state that she had been when he found her. 

They were just putting on the final stabilizers when Pepper walked in and announced that Obadiah was upstairs waiting to talk to Tony.

“I though you said you were done making weapons,” Pepper said, watching them attach the handpiece.

“This is a flight stabilizer. It’s completely harmless,” Tony assured her. Then he turned away and was looking at something else when the stabilizer suddenly powered up and let out a blast, directly at Lyra, who jumped out of the way as much as she could. The window behind her shattered. 

“Lyra!” Tony called and dove towards her over all the scattered papers. She was on her knees with her hand covering her left arm, looking annoyed but okay. Tony gently picked her hand up and saw a red angry burn covering the side of her arm. 

“Oh man, I’m so sorry,” Tony said to her and rushed over to go get some of the burn cream he kept in the shop. “I didn’t expect that.”

“I think you just lost your repulsor privileges,” Lyra muttered sarcastically, through gritted teeth. Pepper was kneeling down next to Lyra also worrying over her. Pepper barely dodged out of the way as Dummy, who had rushed over at the sound of crashes, doused Lyra in white foam. It actually helped to cool down the fire on her arm, but when Tony came back and saw her completely covered in the stuff it was his turn to laugh while Lyra glared at him. 

“Go talk to your business partner. I’m going to go take a shower,” Lyra said grumpily and wiped some of the foam off her face. 

“What? You don’t want to talk to Oby?” Tony said, jokingly, but got a serious look in return.

“No there’s something off about him,” Lyra said, rubbing at the burn on her arm and then disappearing upstairs.

“Sorry!” Tony called again after her, though he was still chuckling. The burn would hurt, but it was nothing serious. 

 

“Day 11, test 37, configuration 2.0. For lack of a better option, Dummy is still on fire safety. If you douse me again, and I’m not on fire, I’m donating you to a city college.” Lyra had to smile at the way Tony treated his robots like they were children. He could never know that she had secretly programed Dummy to douse him no matter what. 

“Seriously, just gonna start off with 1% thrust capacity. Three, two, one.” Tony gently lifted off the floor and used his outstretched hands to keep himself upright. Lyra was looking at the computer, reading the data that they were collecting for calibrating their balancing systems. She was absorbed in her work and she didn’t pay attention until she looked up and he was over the cars.

“Not the car, not the car! Table! Could be worse, could be worse. We’re fine. Okay.” Lyra smirked and watched him clumsily fly around the room. Their systems all looked good. Tony landed without a problem this time and stopped Dummy from dousing him, overriding her programming, but she was too excited to care. 

“Alright, let’s go with the rest of it!” she said happily and Tony moved to where the rest of his suit was going to come on. Everything ran smoothly, as predicted and they checked out the interface Lyra had been so lovingly working on, integrating it with Jarvis and running diagnostics. She knew that Tony had to shut down the suit to finish the testing and so she left upstairs to go grab a cup of coffee.

When she came back, there was no Tony. A quick glance to the data screens showed exactly where he was and Lyra almost noped right back out of the lab to enjoy her coffee in peace. Instead, she reminded herself that he was her idiot and then sat down and pulled on a headset. 

“Tony,” she said sweetly into the microphone, “you wouldn’t happen to be 70,000 ft over the city at the moment and climbing, would you?”

“That,” Tony answered similarly calm, “is a good question that really depends on your perspective. I haven’t left the stratosphere yet, if that makes any difference.”

“Well, why don’t you come back down before all the fluids in your suit start freezing?”

“Sir, there is a potentially fatal buildup of ice occurring,” Jarvis cut in. Tony could almost feel the look that Lyra was undoubtedly giving him. 

“Keep going! Higher!” Tony said anyway, seeing how close he was to breaking the record. 

Lyra noticed the power cut off on the suit and began to panic just a little bit. If Tony were to die right now she would no doubt get the blame for it and have to go back into hiding. She wracked her brain for a suitable solution while she patched herself through to the independent radio that she had put into his helmet for times just like this. 

“Tony!” She called out, not successful in keeping all the panic from her voice.

“Lyra? Uh, maybe you were right. Little help here? Like, before I splat all over this street?” Tony called out, definitely panicking. 

“Ummm there’s a switch just below your knee that will force the flight stabilizers to expand manually. Can you reach it? That might get enough of the ice out to reboot.”

There was a lot of silence on the other end and Lyra was praying that he hadn’t passed out. There was nothing she could do right now but wait and she hated herself for it. After a few tense moments that felt like a lifetime she heard a whoop of joy that was obviously Tony’s. She let out a breath of relief. 

“Manual independent radio, huh? Good for contact when the suit doesn’t have power. Nice touch,” Tony’s voice came through. 

“Anthony Edward Stark--” Lyra began, her voice shaking with fury.

“I know, I know, I’m headed straight back. I promise,” Tony interrupted, and Lyra rubbed her temples and then finished the cup of coffee in a gulp. She was ready to give Tony a huge piece of her mind when he got back. And that’s exactly what she did.

 

After the incident with the ice, Lyra realized that on top of trying to create a specialized flight suit with state-of-the-art tracking and visual systems, she needed to also plan for Tony’s recklessness and stupidity. She sat down to redraw a bunch of different plans for the suit and make improvements. She knew that she couldn’t fix everything, but the feeling that she had had when Tony had been falling without power had been downright terrible. She was starting to realize that she had grown closer to Tony than just about anyone, though she would never admit that. 

“Wanna go to a party?” Tony asked, startling Lyra out of her work. She didn’t answer, just glared at him for a moment and then went back to working. 

“You really, really, need to get out more, Cinderella. Go find a ball and a prince and—”

“Have fun, Tony.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thanks for reading!  
> Comments are always appreciated!


	3. I am Iron Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Iron Man suit has been made. Now they just need to figure out what they're going to do with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone!  
> Shorter chapter this time than the rest, but more to come.

The party was going great, in Tony’s opinion. He hadn’t expected to see Pepper there, but man did she look great. He tried and failed to keep his distance from her and before he knew it, they went from talking to dancing together to getting some air on the roof. He left to go get them drinks when everything fell apart. 

“Wow. Tony Stark. Fancy seeing you here.” A voice called to him and he turned to see…

“Oh hey… Carrie.”

“Christine,” she corrected him. 

“That’s right,” Tony said, still off balance and not knowing where she was going to go with this. 

“You have a lot of nerve showing up here tonight. Can I at least get a reaction from you?”

“Panic. I would say panic is my reaction.”

“Accountability? I actually almost bought it, hook, line, and sinker. I can’t believe it.” Christine gave him a disgusted look and walked away.

Tony was confused for a moment and then regained enough sense to realize that his phone had been buzzing. It was Lyra. 

“Hello?”

“Tony. You might want to look at this…” Lyra sent him photos from a news crew, which he studied in shock. There was no way that anyone legitimate had resupplied the Ten Rings that quickly. 

“I didn’t approve any shipment,” Tony said softly. 

“Well, your company did,” Lyra said, her voice taking the cold tone that he had come accustomed to in the cave. 

“Well, I’m not my company,” Tony said stubbornly, though he knew that that was just going to make her more irritated.

“Well, maybe you should find out who is,” Lyra snapped and then hung up on him. 

A dark idea was entering Tony’s mind as he walked out of the doors and back into the press. It wasn’t hard to find Obadiah in the crowd and he pushed his way through people to get to him. 

“Have you seen these pictures? What’s going on in Gulmira?” Tony immediately asked, ignoring the comments and questions from the press. 

“Tony, Tony. You can’t afford to be this naïve,” Obadiah said easily, his expression remaining steady. 

“You know what? I was naïve before, when they said, ‘Here’s the line. We don’t cross it. This is how we do business.’ If we’re double-dealing under the table… Are we?” Tony was laser-focused on Obadiah and was surprised when the older man threw a hand around his shoulders. Like they were still old friends. 

“Let’s take a picture. Come on. Picture time!” Stane seemed almost cheery as he smiled for the cameras. Tony had been trained well and also made an effort to not show what he was feeling as the press took the pictures. 

“Tony. Who do you think locked you out?” Stane murmured into Tony’s ear as the two men posed. “I was the one who filed the injunction against you. It was the only way I could protect you.”

Even through Tony’s best efforts, he was sure that there was probably a picture taken of the exact moment that whatever remaining innocence he had had been stamped out. After that, Obadiah left and Tony headed straight back to his car and back home, not able to think about anything other than the total and utter betrayal he had just witnessed. All these years, he had relied on Obadiah, trusted him. Only to find out that everything he had done had been to use Tony for his own profit. 

When he got home, Lyra was still understandably in a bad mood—she had been that way ever since his impromptu flight—but when she saw his face hers softened a little bit. He sat on the work bench and eventually found himself pouring out the whole story to Lyra. Everything. She didn’t interrupt or react, just listened and let him rest his head in her lap. In the background the news story about Gulmira kept running from when Lyra had been watching it before. They both found themselves listening in silence.

“I’m going to go,” Tony stated after a while. finally sitting back up. There were so many different emotions running through his brain that sitting there and thinking would drive him crazy. His old self would probably decide to drink the pain away, and he might just do that later, but now the most identifiable feeling that he had was guilt and shame, which weren’t so easily forgotten. Lyra had been right, the fact that he had been providing weapons for the company without every looking too closely at where they went made it his fault when they were used to kill innocent people. It was about time that he do something about that. 

“Going to go where?” Lyra asked, still watching the screen. A deep look of empathy was on her face as she watched the retreating refugees. 

“I have to stop that,” Tony answered blankly.

Lyra looked up at him, her expression also blank. He wished that she would share what she was feeling with him more. He had gotten her to open up just a little bit since she had joined him, but when it came to anything serious she was distant and cold. 

“Then stop them,” she said simply, surprising Tony. Her face turned fierce, with all the same passion and fury that Tony was feeling at the moment. Tony took a deep breath. Of course she would be feeling something similar. She had also been supplying them with weapons for the last year. They shared a look like they were coming to an agreement about something and then Tony turned around and walked to the platform the put his suit on. In just three minutes from the time he decided to leave, he was gone. 

Lyra monitored the news, the data coming in from the suit, and did small course corrections to smooth out the systems while he was gone. She hadn’t anticipated how much the gunfire would disrupt the systems and she had to compensate for that by sending manual updates to the suits drivers. The confrontation went smoothly, until on the way back he got tangled with the US Air Force.

“Tell Rhodey to call them off. Tell him it’s you,” Lyra said into the radio, clearly annoyed after hearing their conversation, as Tony clung to the bottom of the jet. She was looking at the radar of the area and intercepting their radio conversations. “Oh shit, they spotted you.”

“But he told me that he didn’t want to see what I was working on.”

“I don’t think that that applies to your untimely death at the hands of the Air Force, Stark,” Lyra said lazily. She was already hacking the jet’s computers so that they would lose tracking and weapon abilities. Then her eyes widened at the sound of the cry on the radio and a plane abruptly dropping off the radar. “Or anyone else’s untimely death. Did you seriously just knock a plane down?” She listened some more. “Their chute is jammed!”

“On it,” Tony answered and then Lyra could see the drop in altitude as he dived. Lyra held her breath at the silent minutes while everyone listened to the descent of the unfortunate pilot. 

“Good chute!” The cry finally came and Lyra relaxed into her chair and took a breath. She listened to Tony talk to Rhodey some more, not wanting to interrupt. She also held her silence for the rest of his flight home, which scared him because he knew that it was going to be bad when he got back.

 

“If that pilot had died it would have been all your fault. What were you thinking? You could have waited like 20 more seconds for me to hack their radars and lose you, but no. You had to go flying around them like a kid flaunting your armor. You egotistical idiot. I can’t believe that you—”

“It was a mistake,” Tony said, putting his hands up in the armor to try to ward off her verbal attacks. She was always the most vocal when she was mad at him. 

“You’re not allowed to make mistakes, Tony. It’s life or death out there. If you can’t rely on me to do my job then I’m not going to help you,” she knew that she was being hard on him, but she needed to impress upon him the seriousness of going on missions like that, just like she had been taught to do. She doubted whether he had ever been in a stressful situation like that, other than the cave. 

“Pilot didn’t die. I’ll be more careful. Apparently you have a job now?” Tony said after a moment of taking in her words. She looked surprised as she realized what she had said. ”Hey, I did realize that this is something that I have to do now. I can’t just stop with that one. I need to erase all the misdoings of my past. If you feel the same, then we’re in this together. What do you say? Partners?” He extended a metal hand. Lyra bit her lip, thinking for a moment. Then she took it and shook. 

“Ow, let go!” she yelped as he squeezed her hand and little too tightly in the armor. He let go and she shook her hand out, throwing him a dark look. However, she could almost feel the two of them start working out algorithms to make sure that the suit could have a more delicate touch when needed. Together, they could perfect the design and run missions. They’d be unstoppable. 

“Now, let’s see if we can get this darn thing off,” Tony muttered, eyeing all the dents and damage from the bullets the armor had blocked. He already felt the bruises forming on his body. He stepped up to the platform and the robotics activated, attempting to take apart the armor, but their programming was thrown off by the damage. They were doing their best, but the result was just yanking Tony around. 

“Sir, the more you struggle, the more this is going to hurt,” Jarvis advised. 

“Be gentle. This is my first time,” Tony said, trying not to grunt when the robots hit down on a particularly large bruise. This was getting nowhere. “I designed this to come off, so… I really should be able to…”

“Please, try not to move, sir.” Jarvis sounded like he was enjoying this, curse him. Speaking of enjoyment, Lyra was watching him with a small smile on her face that she was trying to hide by drinking coffee and leaning against the work table. 

“Hey, why don’t you give me a little help here, partner?” Tony asked sarcastically. Lyra shrugged and turned around to find something. 

“What’s going on here?” Pepper’s voice rang out in the shop. Everything froze for a moment. 

“Let’s face it. This is not the worst thing you’ve caught me doing,” Tony pleaded, earning a scoff from Lyra. 

“Are those bullet holes?” Pepper asked, in shock. Tony and Lyra shared a glance, neither of them knowing how to explain this to Pepper. Pepper, regaining her senses, then whirled around at Lyra. 

“It’s you! Ever since you showed up Tony’s been shutting down his business and working on secret projects and now showing up covered in bullet holes! I don’t know what you did to him over there, but I’m not just going to sit around and let you—”

“Pep! Hey, come on. It’s not her fault. This was my idea. All of it,” Tony got between them, stopping Pepper’s advance on Lyra. “I’m fine, really. It’s thanks to her that I’m fine.”

Pepper stopped, but kept glaring at Lyra, who was looking around in shock. She hadn’t expected Pepper to go off on her like that. It was evident that these had been things that Pepper had been thinking for a long time now and they had all come out at once. It really showed how much Pepper cared about Tony.

“If he gets hurt at all I’m going to make sure that you get all the blame,” Pepper said coldly, and then turned and stalked out of the shop. 

“Sorry, I’ll go talk to her,” Tony said, making a move to run after her. 

“Wait, no. She’s perfectly fine. Just looking out for you. Besides, you probably don’t want to go stomping around in that thing.” Lyra grabbed his retreating arm and yanked hard enough for the suit to register the force. Tony turned back around and saw Lyra holding an electric hand drill, an evil look in her eye.

“Let’s get started.”

 

“Welcome,” Raza said to Obadiah as he exited the car. Stane walked up to Raza and then turned to get a better look at the other man’s face. “Compliments of Tony Stark,” Raza explained, keeping a straight face. 

Obadiah gave a businesslike smile and replied, “If you’d killed him when you were supposed to, you’d still have a face.”

“You paid us trinkets to kill a prince.”

“Show me the weapon.”

“Come. Leave your guards outside.”

After Obadiah signaled for his people to remain there, they both walked inside to where Raza’s men had reassembled the majority of the first iron man suit. Obadiah walked up to it to inspect it. 

“His escape bore unexpected fruit,” Raza said, ignoring the suit and walking over to the table, he grabbed some of the papers that they had been able to scrap together from the mostly destroyed workshop. He held them up for Obadiah to see and then threw them back on the table. 

“So this is how he did it,” Obadiah muttered to himself, still checking out the tech in front of him. Then he walked to the table to view the papers that Raza had indicated. 

“This is only a first, crude effort. Stark has perfected his design. He has made a masterpiece of death. A man with a dozen of these can rule all of Asia. And you dream of Stark’s throne. We have a common enemy,” Raza walked across the room again and sat down. “If we are still in business, I will give you these designs as a gift. And in turn, I hope you’ll repay me with a gift of iron soldiers.”

Raza looked up to see Obadiah had walked over to where he sat and he put a hand on his shoulder, with a smile on his face. Then Raza heard a click and a high pitched sound, and his entire body froze. 

“Technology,” Obadiah said, his ear protection glowing blue. “It’s always been your Achilles heel in this part of the world. Don’t worry It’ll only last for 15 minutes. That’s the least of your problems now.” Obadiah now held up the papers so that the other man could see them. “This. This isn’t even mostly Tony’s handwriting. Looks like you had a princess all along.”

Obadiah put the papers into his suit pocket and the smoothed it over and exited the tent. 

“Crate up the armor and the rest of it,” he said, walked back to the car. Behind him the guards had all of Raza’s men on their knees. “All right. Let’s finish up here,” he said briskly. The sound of gunfire echoed through the night. 

 

“We need to tighten up the plating and maybe give it another few millimeters around sectors 27A. I’ll get Jarvis on the fabrication while I disassemble it,” Lyra said, working on the holotable and holding up a big piece of the suit. 

“It’s fine. That’ll take too long. Just leave it alone,” Tony said, seriously and she looked up at him suspiciously. 

“The bruising along your back says otherwise. Besides, weren’t you the one that said that we have no need to rush?” Lyra asked curiously. Noting that Pepper had just made an entrance behind Tony. 

“I said no,” Tony snapped, “We need to get it back up and running as soon as possible.”

Lyra held up her hands in surrender and then turned the holotable off, sharing a look with Pepper. Tony turned around to see what she was looking at.

“Hey. You busy? You mind if I send you on an errand? I need you to go to my office. You’re going to hack into the mainframe and you’re gonna retrieve all the recent shipping manifests.” He said all that while still focusing on his work. He handed her a thumb drive and then went back to what he was working on. “This is a lock chip. This’ll get you in. It’s probably under Executive Files. If not, they put in on a ghost drive, in which case you need to look for the lowest numeric heading.”

“And what do you plan to do with this information if I bring it back here?” Pepper said, picking up on what Lyra had seemed so exasperated by.

“Same drill,” Tony said, still not looking her in the eye. “They’ve been dealing under the table, and I’m going to stop them. I’m going to find my weapons and destroy them.” 

“Tony, you know that I would help you with anything, but I cannot help you if you’re going to start all of this again.”  
Tony finally looked up at Pepper and then his eyes flicked to Lyra, who was also giving him a look. “There is nothing except this. There’s no art opening. There is no benefit. There is nothing to sign. There is the next mission and nothing else.” He was looking Pepper straight in the eyes now. His eyes were cold and detached, but most importantly determined. 

“Is that so?” Pepper asked coolly. “Well, then, I quit.” She threw the drive back onto the table and started to walk away.

Tony looked stunned for a moment, and then quickly made his face emotionless. “You stood by my side all these years while I reaped the benefits of destruction. And now that I’m trying to protect the people that I put in harm’s way, you’re going to walk out?”

“You’re going to kill yourself, Tony. I’m not going to be a part of it,” Pepper turned and looked at him just as emotionless. 

“I shouldn’t be alive,” Tony said, sitting down. “Unless is was for a reason. I’m not crazy, Pepper. I just finally know what I have to do. And I know in my heart that it’s right.”

Pepper turned to Lyra and asked, “Is this you?” It was a vague question, more of an accusation really, but Lyra understood the meaning. 

“Don’t look at me, I’m trying to tell him to wait until it’s safer,” Lyra said quietly. 

Pepper slowly took a breath and then walked back and picked up the drive again. “You’re all I have too, you know.” 

 

“She’s right, you know,” Lyra said softly when Pepper left. “This is reckless. And that’s coming from me.”

“I thought that you were all for making up for my past mistakes. What happened? You were the one that always told me how awful I was. If I die trying to do that, what’s it to you?” Tony taunted, but then regretted it when Lyra looked away, clearly hurt by his words. 

“It’s all pointless if you die,” Lyra said, then looked back at him, genuinely angry. “Yinsen told you not to waste your life and throwing it away because you’re too dumb to not take advice from people who care about you seems like a pretty big waste to me.”

Tony looked shocked again and Lyra rolled her eyes in disgust. She thought that he’d have gotten the hint by now that he was being his old selfish self again. “Lyra…” he said uncertainly.

“Just leave. I’m going to finish loading the new sequences into the suit and patch it up. I’ll tell you when it’s done,” Lyra said, then focused back on the computer in front of her and ignored Tony until he went upstairs. 

 

Still angry and confused, Tony wandered around his upstairs apartment. Not knowing what to do with himself or why he had allowed Lyra to banish him from his own damn lab. After a while, though, he cooled down and started to think about things a little more logically. Maybe being reckless here wasn’t the answer. Then there was also the other part of what Lyra had said about caring about him. With how much she had detested him while they were in the cave he hadn’t exactly been expecting that. At least not out loud. 

He dramatically plopped himself onto the couch to finish moping. There was no way he was going to go back down there with an angry Lyra that didn’t want him around. After a while he looked down to see his phone ringing. It was Pepper. He scooped it up and answered right away, hoping that nothing was wrong. At that moment a mysterious stiffness entered his body and he realized that he could no longer move. Still holding up the phone he heard Pepper’s panicked voice.

“Tony? Tony, are you there? Hello?”

 

Lyra lost track of time while working, and the next thing that she heard was a familiar voice saying, “Turn around slowly.” She had been threatened enough times to know the tone and so she dropped what she was working on and put her hands up, doing as he said. She wasn’t entirely surprised to see Obadiah behind her, gun in hand. He had always given her a bad vibe. 

“Let’s take a walk.”

He led her out of the room and up the stairs. Her hands were in the air in the classic “don’t shoot me I’m not a threat” pose, but she knew that if that had been his intent it would have happened already. They got up the stairs and Lyra saw Tony looking strained and slouched over on the couch. It took everything she had not to run over to him. She immediately noticed that the arch reactor in his chest had been ripped out and not gracefully. She looked behind her to see Obadiah had a case in his other hand. She had been too distracted by the gun to notice what else he was holding.

“Imagine my disappointment when I looked over all the designs only to realize that most of it wasn’t yours,” the man drawled, still perfectly calm and seeming to enjoy the panic in Tony’s eyes. “I have to thank you for discovering her. It’d be a shame to let such talent go to waste. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of her.”

Lyra made sure to keep her face perfectly blank throughout the entire conversation. It was something that she had become really good at, though she slipped up a little as Obadiah grabbed her arm and led her towards the door. She looked Tony up and down like this was the last time that she’d ever see him. Then the door closed and she was gone. 

Obadiah led her to a car and motioned for her to get into the back. He got in next to her, never taking the gun off of her. The driver started the car and they were off to… wherever. 

“What do you want from me?” Lyra asked, her tone cold and even. She could see that Obadiah looked impressed by her act. 

“The only thing you’re useful for,” Obadiah said casually. “The Ten Rings knew it, and Tony knew it too. Now it’s my turn to own you.”

Lyra sighed and settled into the seat, resting her hand on her chin she looked up at Obadiah. “Don’t count on it,” she said and then looked out the window silently for the rest of the car ride. 

“You’re going to integrate this,” Obadiah held out the case with Tony’s reactor, “into this,” he motioned to an oversized mechanical suit, “and make it quick.”

Lyra took the case thoughtfully. “And what if I can’t?” she asked, more out of ceremony than inquiry.

Obadiah used his now free hand it grab her by the throat, not enough to completely cut off her air, but enough to show her that he easily could. “You can. And you will.”

He let go of her and she sucked in a deep breath, looking up at him with deadly venom in her eyes. He chuckled and then turned and walked out of the room. 

Lyra got to work. The suit that he had already made was crude, but there was no denying its power. She did the bare necessities connecting the power source from the plans that they gave her. There wasn’t a whole lot she needed to change, and the lab gave her all the materials that she needed. Her mind was thinking of anything she could do to sabotage the system in the process without getting herself killed. 

As soon as she finished the wiring and was about to run diagnostics there was a sound like a small explosion. Lyra looked up in the direction instinctively, but before she could get a good read on what was happening she was shoved aside as Obadiah ran towards the suit. She hit her head on the desk with a sickening crack and then everything was muffled and blurry. 

When she came to, Pepper was standing a few feet away, nervously looking into the dark. With a groan she put a hand to her forehead and it came away bloody, but even through her daze she knew that being there right then wasn’t a good idea. Using all of her focus she got to her feet and then saw Pepper turn towards her, completely missing the grabbing metal hand behind her. In a burst of adrenaline, Lyra tackled Pepper out of the way, forced her to remain on her feet, and then grabbed her arm and started running the other way. Pepper was screaming and struggling to keep up in her heels, but behind them were the unmistakable sounds of Obadiah in the suit chasing after them. Lyra kept her focus ahead of her and eventually they ran past a couple of others, who unsuccessfully tried to shoot at the suit behind them. Lyra didn’t slow their pace until they were outside. The doorway was too small for Obadiah’s machine to fit through.

“Pepper?” Tony’s voice came through her earpiece, though it Lyra only heard a faint sound.

“Tony!” Pepper screamed in panic. “Tony, are you okay? Obadiah, he’s gone insane! He built a suit.”

Lyra was too busy watching the ground shake and crumble in front of her to pay much attention to the conversation. She stood in front of Pepper and got her attention when she forced her a few steps back, knowing that running likely wouldn’t get them anywhere once he started firing. 

“Where do you think you’re going?” Obadiah drawled. He pointed the rather large gun at the two of them. “Your services are no longer required.” Lyra kept her stance in front of Pepper, glaring at Obadiah.

“Stane!” Tony yelled from above, effectively gaining his attention. They collided and then were pushed away from the area so that Lyra and Pepper were just left with sounds of metal crunching and bullets. Lyra ran back into the destroyed lab and snapped some agents out of shock, directing them to go give medical care to the injured. She approached a computer and efficiently gained access to the systems, which was easy since she had just been working on them. She found the right program and patched herself through to Tony. 

“Tony!”

“Lyra, are you okay?” Tony asked, but he sounded understandably distracted. 

“Yeah, we’re fine. What are you going to do about Obadiah?”

“I’m hoping I either get through this so that I didn’t have to listen to this shitty monologue for nothing.”

“Not helping, Tony.”

There was a lot of silence on Tony’s end, presumably while they fought, then he came back. 

“Hey, we fixed that icing problem, right?”

“You know what problem we didn’t fix? Using a chest piece that doesn’t have enough power for it to matter,” Lyra said, immediately understanding what he was getting at and making her opinion on it clear. 

“Take me to maximum altitude,” Tony demanded.

“With only 15% power, the odds of reaching that—” Jarvis began.

“I know the math! Do it!”

Lyra stayed silent, just watched the screen that showed some basic data and bit her lip. She knew the math too, and it wasn’t good. But she’d seen worse odds. 

“Aaannd he’s down,” Tony said, and Lyra watched as he conserved power by slowly using it in bursts before he got to terminal velocity. She calculated that he would just make it.

“Potts?” Tony said, turning on the other COMM. 

“Tony! Oh my God, are you okay?”

“I’m almost out of power. I’ve got to get out of this thing. I’ll be right there.”

“Look out!” Lyra’s warning rang out as she looked up to see the larger suit fly over. Tony barely had time to turn around and put his facemask back on when Obadiah came up behind him and hit him hard across the chest. Lyra watched as the damages on his suit kept getting worse, wishing that she was able to do more for him. If she were in the lab she could have been reading the data and rerouting power accordingly for the best efficiency on the fly, but as of now she could only sit and watch.

“Potts?” Tony whispered, chiming in both to Lyra and Pepper.

“Tony!” Pepper said back, still obviously panicking.

“This isn’t working. We’re going to have to overload the reactor and blast the roof.”

“Well, how are you going to do that?” Pepper asked, while Lyra already started getting through to the overrides on her already hacked computer. 

“Go up to the central console, open up all the circuits. Lyra will reroute the power so that whatever’s open gets the juice. When I get clear of the roof, I’ll let you know. You’re going to hit the master bypass button. It’s going to fry everything up here.”

Pepper cautiously made her way through the broken glass into the lab. “Okay. I’m going in now.” She spotted Lyra, who was already working at the computer and walked up to her. 

“Which ones do I open?” she asked, her voice wavering. 

“All of them. The switched are over there,” Lyra pointed. “And then we need to get out of here quick.”  
“Make sure you wait till I clear the roof,” Tony reminded them, startling both of them. There were more sounds of fighting above them as Pepper got to the switches and the two women shared a look. Pepper was slightly reassured by the confidence in Lyra’s eyes, but Lyra knew that it was all fake. She finished with the computer and went to the control panels, flipping the necessary switches. When she just had one more button to press to start the overload she gave Pepper a thumbs up.

“It’s ready, Tony! Get off the roof!” Pepper yelled into her earpiece. 

They both looked up desperately where Tony was standing only to hear gunfire and then duck down as shattered glass fell from overhead. They saw Tony hanging from the ceiling where the glass had been. They could hear the conversation now. 

“How ironic, Tony. Trying to rid the world of weapons, you gave it its best one ever. And now, I’m going to kill you with it!” Obadiah fired at Tony and Lyra and Pepper gasped, but it missed. “You ripped out my targeting system!” Obadiah bellowed in frustration. 

“Lyra!” Tony called, “Time to hit the button!”

“You told us not to!” Pepper called back, keeping an eye on Lyra, who had her finger over the button, but kept her eyes on the situation above. Obadiah fired again, but it was another miss, though closer this time. 

“Just do it!” Tony yelled.

“You’ll die!” The anguish in Pepper’s voice was heartbreaking, and Lyra found herself agreeing with it. She kept her hand over the button, hesitating. Trying to calculate in her brain the chances of success and any other way that they could get out of this. The third time that Obadiah fired and missed, Tony dropped down so that he was hanging from one hand and looked Lyra right in the eyes. 

“PUSH IT!” He ordered. His eyes showing that he still wasn’t giving up. It snapped Lyra out of her hesitation and she slammed her hand onto the button. The reaction was immediate and powerful. She covered her head and then grabbed Pepper and made their way to the door, watching an enormous white beam of energy shoot up into the sky. There was one last explosion and then everything stopped. They stood outside listening to the creak of metal for a moment, before Lyra and Pepper shared a look and then both ran back in and up the emergency stairs to the roof. 

Tony was lying on a piece of grating that hadn’t fallen in the explosion. Lyra’s first thought was that he looked relatively undamaged, but he was knocked out. Her heart sunk in horror as she noticed that the chest piece was flickering. 

“Help me get him over here,” Lyra demanded, grabbing his arm and tugging. He was too heavy for her to move alone, but with Pepper’s help and a lot of adrenaline, they managed to drag Tony’s body onto more stable ground. Lyra immediately began taking apart the chest piece and inspecting it quickly. It didn’t look all that damaged, but it needed to be on again. Without it, Tony could die at any moment. It was just a roll of the dice. 

“Do you have anything electronic on you?” Lyra snapped, and Pepper held out her phone, which Lyra took and then immediately smashed and started taking apart as well. She needed to jumpstart the piece. She prayed that it would work. 

“You’re not allowed to die on me yet, Tony Stark,” Lyra said, while she worked. Pepper stared down at her in surprise. Lyra’s usually snarky and guarded voice was showing actual concern and pain. Her face was nothing but determined and hopeful. Just from that Pepper could tell how much the girl had come to care, and any past suspicion in Pepper had vanished.

There was the now all too familiar sound of electricity moving and then the chest piece slowly flickered to life. Breathing out a sigh of relief, Lyra backed away from Tony and ran a hand through her hair. That had been way more stressful than it should have been. Pepper gave her a confused look, which she returned with a small smile and then Pepper relaxed too. Pepper knelt by Tony and they sat there and listened to the sounds of approaching sirens, too exhausted to do anything anymore. 

 

The TV showed the picture that was being recorded in the other room. Pepper was putting the finishing touches on the makeup that covered Tony’s visible injuries. Lyra was working on something on a laptop across the room. 

“’Iron Man’. That’s kind of catchy. It’s got a nice ring to it. I mean, it’s not technically accurate. The suit’s a gold-titanium alloy, but it’s kind of evocative, the imagery, anyway. What do you think Lyrs?” Tony was holding the newspaper with the article across the front. 

“I think, that you’re a self-obsessed dork,” Lyra said, barely looking up from what she was doing. Tony pouted at her, which she promptly ignored. 

“Here’s your alibi.” Coulson said, handing Tony the cards and giving Lyra a suspicious look. When SHIELD had debriefed then both their stories had both been the same, that Tony had and was the sole creator of the suit, but he was getting the feeling that there was more to it than that. “You were on your yacht. We have port papers that put you in Avalon all night, and sworn statements from 50 of your guests.”

Lyra kept a lazy tab on the conversation while she worked on gathering all the known information on SHIELD, which at this point was mostly reading blog posts about shady government activity. She got the feeling that Coulson was suspicious of her and she told herself that she would check her forged documents over again to make sure that her story was as tight as it had been when it was made for her 12 years ago. If they found out exactly where she had been and what she had done they probably wouldn’t be letting her walk around like this. If SHIELD was going to look into her, she would look back and see just how much of a threat they were going to be. 

Coulson left and Tony was finishing up getting ready before heading out in front of the cameras. 

“Are you talking about the night that we danced and went up on the roof, and then you went downstairs to get me a drink,” Pepper was saying seductively. “And you left me there, by myself? Is that the night you’re talking about?”

Lyra let out a loud snort and covered her mouth with her hand to keep from laughing out loud. She decided that she liked Pepper. Tony just shot her a glare. 

“Thought so,” Pepper said, smoothing out his suit for him. “Will that be all, Mr. Stark?”

“Yes, that will be all, Miss Potts.” Tony left the room with his cards and Lyra closed her research and walked over to where Pepper was, watching the broadcast. They exchanged a worried glance. Neither of them knew what Tony was going to end up doing when it came down to it.

“The truth is… I am Iron Man.”

Lyra rolled her eyes hard. This was going to be interesting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks for reading! On to the next chapter of Lyra Stark's crazy adventure now that the origin has been written.  
> Comments are always appreciated!

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading everyone!  
> I'd love your feedback if you get a chance. Is this something that I should keep going with? Should I move on to something else? Do I need to add something that would make it better? Let me know!


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